Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓
Lemon Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Make the batter
Soak the sago in the milk over low heat until soft.
Add the butter to the sago and let it melt.
Mix in the breadcrumbs, sugar, lemon juice, and lemon zest.
Beat the eggs and combine them with the mixture thoroughly.
Steam and serve
Pour the mixture into 2 well-greased pudding basins.
Steam the puddings for 2 hours.
Serve with stewed fruit or white sauce.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Explore the science
The flavor team
The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Lemon + milktop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together19,053 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Lemon + buttertop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,227 recipes
Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
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Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together98,233 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Eggs
- Bind the mixture and help set the pudding as it steams.
- Breadcrumbs
- Provide the bulk and body that hold the pudding together.
- Sago
- Softened in milk, it thickens the mixture and gives a tender texture.
- Butter
- Adds richness and moisture to the pudding.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the pudding and balances the lemon's acidity.
- Lemons
- Supply bright acidity and aroma from the juice and zest.
The step that matters
Soak the sago until fully soft. Sago must be cooked in the milk until fully softened before mixing. Undercooked sago stays hard and grainy, and it will not thicken the batter or give the pudding an even, tender texture.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, milk, butter, sugar):
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits about as well
- Coconutfits about as well
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against egg, milk, butter, sugar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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