Why it works: Butter and milk 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 ↓
Baked Indian Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).
Moisten the cornmeal with cold water.
Mix and bake
Add butter, sugar, raisins, and beaten eggs to the cornmeal mixture.
Fill the mixture with sweet milk and season with your preferred spices.
Pour into a baking dish and bake slowly for half an hour or more.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Sugar + raisintop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together12,481 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Raisin + milktop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,155 recipes
Shared aroma: decanoic acid (acides aroma).
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Butter + eggtop 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
- Cornmeal
- Forms the thick, pudding-like body of the dish as it bakes.
- Eggs
- Help the pudding set and give it a firm, custard-like structure.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the pudding brown gently in the oven.
- Butter
- Adds richness and fat, contributing to a softer, smoother texture.
- Sweet milk
- Supplies the liquid that cooks the cornmeal and gives a creamy texture.
The step that matters
Bake slowly at a low temperature. Cornmeal needs long, gentle heat to fully soften and thicken. Baking too hot can curdle the eggs and dry the surface, leaving the centre grainy or uneven.
Swap the raisin
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, egg, milk):
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits about as well
- Coconutfits about as well
- Raisinthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, milk. 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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