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Dessert

Irish Moss

A pudding made by boiling Irish moss in milk, sweetened and flavored with lemon rind.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 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 ↓

Irish Moss

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the moss

  1. Soak the Irish moss in cold water for 10 to 12 hours, changing the water several times to remove any unpleasant taste.

  2. Drain the moss and pick out any impurities or discolored pieces.

Cook and set

  1. Place the moss in a small saucepan with the milk and bring to a boil.

  2. Simmer for 15 minutes, stirring constantly, until the moss is completely dissolved in the milk.

  3. Sweeten to taste and add a piece of lemon rind for flavor, removing it before serving.

  4. Serve hot or pour into a greased mold and refrigerate until set.

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

  4. Irish moss + milktop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

  5. Irish moss + sugartop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together107 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Irish moss
Seaweed that dissolves into the milk and gels as it cools, giving the pudding its set texture.
Milk
Forms the liquid base and body of the pudding, which the moss thickens and sets.
Sugar
Adds sweetness to balance the mild, slightly marine flavor of the moss.

The step that matters

Simmer with constant stirring until the moss fully dissolves. Milk scorches easily on the bottom of a pan without stirring, which leaves a burnt taste. The moss must dissolve completely so it sets evenly when cooled rather than leaving lumps or a weak, uneven gel.

“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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