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Dessert

Chocolate Bread Pudding

A pudding made from stale bread crumbs, chocolate, milk, eggs, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,466 recipes. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. The science ↓

Chocolate Bread Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Soak the bread

  1. Pour scalded milk over bread crumbs, cover, and let stand for 20 minutes.

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, mix beaten egg yolks with sugar, melted chocolate, baking soda dissolved in hot water, and salt.

  2. Fold in beaten egg whites until well combined.

Bake

  1. Transfer mixture to a buttered pudding dish and bake at 350°F (175°C) until set.

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. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  2. Chocolate + sugartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Chocolate + milktop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,128 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  4. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  5. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Egg yolks enrich and set the custard, while whites folded in lighten the texture.
Bread crumbs
Absorb the hot milk and form the soft body of the pudding.
Milk
Hydrates the bread and forms the custard base, giving moisture and tenderness.
Chocolate
Provides the main flavour and some fat, adding richness to the custard.
Sugar
Sweetens the pudding and helps soften its texture.
Baking soda
Reacts with the chocolate's acidity to lighten the pudding and deepen its colour.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Whites hold air only when beaten to stiff peaks and folded in gently; overmixing deflates them, leaving a denser pudding after baking.

“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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