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Dessert

Savoy Pudding

A baked dessert made from crumbled Savoy cake, butter, mixed peel, sugar, eggs, milk, and sherry or Marsala.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk 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 ↓

Savoy Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the mixture

  1. Pass the crumbled cake through a fine wire sieve.

  2. Add all ingredients except the egg whites and beat well.

Fold and bake

  1. Whisk the egg whites until stiff, then gently fold them into the mixture.

  2. Pour the mixture into a buttered pie dish.

  3. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) for about 1 hour.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Butter + sherrytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,505 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Milk + sherrytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,479 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3,5-trimethylpyrazine (cocoa, roasted).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Egg whites whisked stiff trap air, giving the pudding a light, risen texture; yolks help set it.
Stale sponge cake
Forms the body of the pudding, soaking up the milk and liquid to become soft and spoonable.
Milk
Hydrates the crumbs and adds moisture, so the pudding becomes soft and custard-like as it bakes.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, contributing to a tender texture and flavour.
Sherry or marsala
Adds aroma and a subtly sweet, fortified wine flavour to the pudding.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Whites must be whisked until stiff, then folded gently. Overmixing knocks out the air they hold, so the pudding bakes denser and less light.

“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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