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Dessert

Princess Pudding

A gelatin-based dessert made with milk, eggs, orange juice, lemon juice, sugar, and a touch of cochineal.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and orange match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Princess Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. In a basin, beat the egg yolks lightly.

  2. Boil the milk and pour it over the yolks.

  3. Add the gelatin and return the mixture to the saucepan.

  4. Cook gently without boiling until thick and the gelatin is dissolved.

  5. Stir in the sugar, then pour into a large basin.

  6. Add the orange juice, lemon juice, and cochineal.

Set and serve

  1. Beat the egg whites to stiff peaks and gently fold into the mixture when it is nearly cold.

  2. Pour into a mold and refrigerate until set.

  3. Once set, turn out and serve.

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. Lemon + orangetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  2. Gelatin + sugartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,778 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

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

  4. Milk + orangetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,696 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Egg yolks
Thicken the custard as they cook gently, and add richness and colour to the base.
Gelatin
Sets the liquid mixture so the pudding holds its shape when turned out.
Egg whites
Whipped to stiff peaks, they lighten the set pudding with an airy, fluffy texture.
Milk
Forms the creamy base that the egg yolks thicken into a custard.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the citrus juices.
Orange juice or fruit puree
Adds fruit flavour and liquid to the set pudding.

The step that matters

Cook gently without boiling. Egg yolks thicken from gentle heat; boiling can curdle them into grainy lumps, so the custard must stay below a simmer until it coats a spoon.

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, egg, gelatin, sugar, lemon):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Orangethe original
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Raspberryfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, egg, gelatin, 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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