Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
Newmarket 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 custard
Combine the milk, lemon rind, cinnamon, and bay leaf in a saucepan.
Simmer for a few minutes.
Sweeten the mixture with loaf sugar to taste.
Strain the mixture gradually into the beaten eggs, discarding the reserved egg whites.
Assemble and bake
Layer the bread and butter slices in a baking dish.
Sprinkle the bread and butter with currants.
Pour the egg mixture over the bread and butter.
Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) for 30 minutes.
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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Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Lemon + cinnamontop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together7,950 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
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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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Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together12,655 recipes
Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
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Cinnamon + sugartop 10% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together30,779 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Cinnamon and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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
- Eggs
- Bind the custard and set during baking to give the pudding its firm, sliceable structure.
- Milk
- Provides the liquid that the bread soaks up and the eggs set in, creating a soft, creamy texture.
- Bread
- Soaks up the custard and holds its shape, forming the body of the pudding.
- Butter
- Adds richness and fat that softens the bread and helps it brown on top.
- Currants
- Add pockets of sweetness and chewy texture throughout the pudding.
The step that matters
Strain the mixture gradually into the beaten eggs. Adding hot milk to eggs too quickly can scramble them. Pouring slowly while whisking gently raises the egg temperature so the custard thickens smoothly when baked.
Swap the currant
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, lemon, cinnamon, sugar, egg, bread, butter):
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits better
- Raisinfits better
- Currantthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against milk, lemon, cinnamon, sugar, egg, bread, butter. 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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