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 ↓
Cottage 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
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Make the cake
In a bowl, mix sugar, milk, flour, and butter until smooth.
Pour the batter into a greased baking dish and bake until golden.
Make the sauce
For the sauce, melt 2 tablespoons of butter in a saucepan.
Stir in 1 cup of sugar and 1 tablespoon of flour, then add cold water to mix.
Pour in 1 pint of boiling water and stir continuously for 2-3 minutes.
Remove from heat and flavor with lemon.
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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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
-
Sugar + saucetop 13% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together5,147 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together15,338 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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
- Flour
- Forms the structure of the cake batter as it sets in the oven.
- Butter
- Adds richness and fat that gives the cake a tender crumb.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the cake brown as it bakes.
- Milk
- Adds moisture to the batter, helping it come together smoothly.
The step that matters
Stirring the sauce while it boils. Flour thickens liquid only when it is stirred well as it heats; stirring keeps lumps from forming and the sauce smooth and evenly thickened.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, milk, flour, butter, sauce):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Figfits better
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, milk, flour, butter, sauce. 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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