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Dessert

Transparent Pudding

A light, lemony pudding made with butter, sugar, eggs, lemon, nutmeg, and brandy, finished with a meringue topping.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,318 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Transparent Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Cream the butter and sugar together.

Make the batter

  1. Beat in the egg yolks, lemon juice, grated lemon rind, nutmeg, and brandy.

  2. Gently fold in the egg whites last.

  3. Beat the whites of 4 eggs into the mixture for a nicer finish.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in an open pie crust until set.

  2. Whip the whites of 4 more eggs with 4 tablespoons of sugar and a little lemon juice to make a meringue.

  3. Spread the meringue over the top of the pudding before serving.

  4. Serve cold, and consider baking in patty pans for individual servings.

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. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Nutmeg + brandytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,311 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  3. Butter + brandytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,127 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Butter + nutmegtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together24,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Adds richness and a tender, fine crumb when creamed with sugar.
Sugar
Sweetens the pudding and helps trap air when creamed with butter.
Eggs
Yolks enrich and bind the batter; whites add lightness and help it set.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity and brightness that balances the sweetness.
Brandy
Contributes aroma and warmth to the flavour.

The step that matters

Gently fold in the egg whites last. Egg whites hold air that gives lift and a light texture. Stirring or beating them hard after folding deflates the foam, leaving a dense, heavy pudding.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, egg, nutmeg, brandy):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits about as well
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, nutmeg, brandy. 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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