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Dessert

Prune Pudding

A baked pudding made from prunes, sugar, egg whites, powdered sugar, and butter, served with whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Prune Pudding

Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Prune 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.

Prepare the prunes

  1. Wash and boil the prunes in enough water to cover them, adding sugar to taste.

  2. Drain the juice from the prunes and let them cool.

  3. Remove the pits and chop the prunes until they form a paste.

Make the pudding

  1. Beat the egg whites until very stiff, gradually adding the powdered sugar.

  2. Add the prunes to the egg whites and whip together briefly.

  3. Turn the mixture into a buttered pudding dish and bake at 350°F (175°C) for about 25 minutes.

  4. Serve with whipped cream.

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.

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.

  1. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  3. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 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

Prunes
Provide the main fruit flavour and a thick, sweet body once chopped into a paste.
Egg whites
Whipped into a stiff foam that lightens the pudding and sets it as it bakes.
Powdered sugar
Stabilises the whipped egg whites and adds sweetness without grittiness.

The step that matters

Beat the egg whites until very stiff. Egg whites need to be fully whipped to hold air; under-whipped whites collapse, leaving a dense, flat pudding instead of a light one.

“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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