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Dessert

Plain Rice Pudding, Baked

A baked dessert made from rice, milk, sugar, butter, eggs, and lemon rind.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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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 ↓

Plain Rice Pudding, Baked

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the rice

  1. Wash the rice and partially cook it in boiling water, then drain the water.

Make the custard

  1. Place the rice in a saucepan with 1½ cups of milk and simmer slowly until the rice is tender.

  2. Stir in 2 oz. of butter and 2 oz. of sugar, then remove from heat.

  3. Let it cool slightly, then add 2 whisked eggs and the grated lemon rind.

Bake

  1. Pour the mixture into a well-buttered pie dish.

  2. Optionally, decorate with split raisins before baking.

  3. Bake at 300°F (150°C) for 30 to 40 minutes.

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.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Rice + lemontop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,366 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

  4. Rice + raisintop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together565 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Sugar + raisintop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Rice
Forms the body of the pudding, absorbing milk as it softens.
Eggs
Set the custard when baked, giving the pudding a firm, sliceable texture.
Milk
Provides the liquid that cooks the rice and forms the creamy base.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the pudding brown lightly in the oven.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth mouthfeel to the pudding.

The step that matters

Simmering the rice until tender. Rice must soften fully in the milk before baking, because it will not finish cooking in the oven once the eggs set the custard.

Swap the raisin

The recipe marks raisin as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, sugar, egg, lemon, milk, butter):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Coconutfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Raisinthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, sugar, egg, lemon, milk, 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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