Why it works: Rice and milk match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and 7,354 recipes mention both. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
The recipe
Ingredients
Contains: milk (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
Bake
In a deep coarse pan, combine rice, sugar or treacle, milk, and dripping.
Place the pan in the oven and bake until set, which will take some time.
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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.
-
Rice + milktop 3% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together7,354 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
-
Sugar + milktop 9% of all pairsAroma overlaplowMentioned together77,855 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
-
Rice + sugartop 15% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together8,324 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sugar and milk share little aroma chemistry, yet 77,855 recipes mention both: they likely 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
- Rice
- Starch that swells and softens as it cooks, thickening the pudding and giving it body.
- Milk
- Liquid that cooks the rice and, with its proteins, helps the pudding set creamy.
- Sugar or treacle
- Adds sweetness and flavour, and its dissolved sugars help brown the surface.
- Dripping
- Fat that adds richness and a smooth, savoury mouthfeel to the pudding.
The step that matters
Bake until set. The pudding sets as the rice absorbs milk and the proteins firm up in the oven. Pulling it too early leaves it runny, while baking too long can dry it out and make the surface tough.
“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.
More rice pudding recipes
You might also like
Illustration
Illustration
Illustration
IllustrationThe Sunday pairing: one pairing, the chemistry behind it, and how to cook it. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account for sign-in; Pro adds the full results and chemistry.