Name: Millet Pudding
Ingredients: ¼ pound millet seed; 6 ounces sugar; ¼ pound butter; 2 eggs; 1 quart milk

Why it works: Butter and milk 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 ↓

Millet 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).
Clean, pick, and wash the millet seed.
Butter your baking dish.

Make and bake

In a bowl, mix the millet seed, sugar, butter, eggs, and milk.
Pour the mixture into the dish.
Bake for 1.5 hours.

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.

Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together118,967 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Millet + milktop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together63 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together98,233 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together88,785 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

Millet seed: Forms the body of the pudding as it cooks and softens in the milk.
Eggs: Set when baked, giving the pudding structure and a custard-like firmness.
Milk: Provides the liquid that the millet absorbs and the eggs set within.
Sugar: Adds sweetness and contributes to browning on the baked surface.
Butter: Adds fat for richness and a smoother, softer texture.