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 ↓
Rice 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.
Make the rice
Boil the rice in the milk until soft.
Remove from heat and let it cool.
Mix and bake
Beat the eggs, sugar, and salt together.
Add the butter and flavoring, then mix in the cooled rice.
Pour the mixture into a baking dish.
Bake at 350°F (175°C) for 45 minutes to 1 hour.
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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Rice + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,374 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Rice + buttertop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together9,645 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Sugar + buttertop 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
- Rice
- Starch that softens in the milk and gives the pudding its body and bulk.
- Milk
- Liquid that cooks the rice and, with the eggs, forms the creamy custard base.
- Eggs
- Proteins that set during baking, holding the pudding together while keeping it creamy.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps keep the custard tender.
- Butter
- Adds fat for richness and a smoother, softer texture.
The step that matters
Let the rice cool before mixing it with the eggs. Hot rice can begin to scramble the beaten eggs unevenly, leaving lumps instead of a smooth custard. Cooling it first lets the eggs set gently and evenly during 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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