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Dessert

Vermicelli Pudding with Apples or Without

A baked pudding made from vermicelli, milk, butter, sugar, lemon zest, and optional preserved fruit.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 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 ↓

Vermicelli Pudding with Apples or Without

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

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Make the pudding

  1. Boil the vermicelli in milk until soft.

  2. Stir in the butter, sugar, and lemon zest.

  3. Pour the mixture into a baking dish.

Bake and serve

  1. If desired, add warmed preserved fruit or compote on top.

  2. Bake until the pudding is golden brown, about 30-40 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. Milk + plumtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together406 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Lemon + plumtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together623 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

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

  5. Butter + plumtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together710 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

What each ingredient does

Vermicelli
Cooked in milk until soft, it forms the starchy body that holds the pudding together.
Milk
Cooks with the pasta to add moisture and a creamy, custard-like texture.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth mouthfeel, and helps browning in the oven.
Powdered sugar
Adds sweetness and dissolves easily into the warm mixture without graininess.
Lemon zest
Adds bright aromatic oils that balance the richness of the milk and butter.

The step that matters

Cooking the vermicelli in milk until soft. The pasta must absorb milk and soften fully, since starch gelatinizes as it cooks and sets the pudding's body. Undercooked noodles stay firm, while milk left to scorch on the bottom of the pan can burn and stick.

Swap the plum

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Peachfits better
  4. Plumthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, butter, sugar, lemon. 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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