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Dessert

Albert Pudding

A steamed custard pudding flavored with cinnamon, citron, and figs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and fig match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 614 recipes. Both carry cinnamyl acetate, which smells sweet aromatic, cinnamon. The science ↓

Albert Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Boil the cream with sugar and cinnamon until combined.

  2. Whisk in the egg yolks to create a thick custard.

Assemble and steam

  1. Grease a mould with butter and line it with strips of citron and figs in a pattern.

  2. Pour the cold custard into the lined mould.

  3. Tie it up and steam for 1 hour.

Cool and serve

  1. Let it cool, then turn it out and serve cold with custard around it.

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. Cinnamon + figtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together614 recipes

    Shared aroma: cinnamyl acetate (sweet aromatic, cinnamon).

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  4. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Butter + figtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,042 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and cinnamon 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

Cream
Provides richness and a smooth, tender body to the custard.
Egg yolks
Thicken the custard and set it as it cooks, giving the pudding structure.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and helps keep it soft and tender.
Citron
Adds a tart, aromatic flavour contrasting with the sweet custard.
Figs
Add sweetness and a soft, chewy texture to the pattern.

The step that matters

Whisk in the egg yolks to create a thick custard. Egg yolks thicken when heated gently but can scramble if the mixture gets too hot or is added too fast. Whisking steadily while combining helps keep the custard smooth so it sets evenly when steamed.

Swap the fig

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, sugar, cinnamon, egg, butter):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits about as well
  3. Figthe original
  4. Coconutfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, sugar, cinnamon, egg, 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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