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Semolina Pudding

A sweet pudding made by boiling semolina in milk, sweetened with sugar and vanilla, then baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Semolina Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the semolina

  1. Boil the semolina in the milk until well thickened.

  2. Add sugar and vanilla to taste.

Bake and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into a small pie dish.

  2. Bake until golden brown.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

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.

  1. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  2. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Semolina + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together351 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Semolina + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together316 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Semolina
Its starch swells and thickens in hot milk, giving the pudding its body.
Milk
Provides the liquid that the semolina thickens, and adds softness and richness.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the top turn golden brown in the oven.

The step that matters

Thicken the semolina fully before baking. Semolina starch only swells and thickens properly when it is heated in the liquid for long enough. If it is undercooked, the pudding will stay thin and grainy rather than set into a smooth, firm texture.

“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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