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Dessert

Delmonico Pudding

A custard pudding made with egg yolks, cornstarch, milk, sugar, and topped with fruit and meringue.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and peach work together. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 781 recipes. Both carry phellandrene, which smells minty. The science ↓

Delmonico Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Beat the egg yolks until light, then add the sugar and beat until very light.

  2. Mix the cornstarch with a little cold milk, then combine it with the egg mixture.

  3. Stir the combined mixture into 1 quart of milk in a saucepan over medium heat, add a little salt, and stir until the mixture thickens well.

Assemble and bake

  1. Pour the thickened custard into a serving dish.

  2. Place the dish in the oven until it can bear icing.

  3. Top the custard with a layer of canned peaches or other fruit.

  4. If desired, mix the fruit syrup with the custard.

Make the meringue

  1. Beat the egg whites to a stiff froth, then add 2 tablespoons of sugar.

  2. Spread the egg white mixture over the pudding.

  3. Return the dish to the oven until the meringue is light brown.

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 + peachtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together781 recipes

    Shared aroma: phellandrene (minty).

  2. Sugar + peachtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,308 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

  5. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

Sugar and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Cornstarch
Thickens the milk and egg mixture into a smooth custard as it heats.
Egg yolks
Enrich and thicken the custard, adding richness and a smooth texture.
Egg whites
Whipped into a stiff foam that forms the light meringue topping.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and, in the whites, stabilises the meringue and helps it brown.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard that thickens with the starch and yolks.

The step that matters

Stir the custard until it thickens well. Cornstarch only thickens fully when the mixture reaches a simmer while being stirred, so stopping early leaves the custard thin. Constant stirring over medium heat also prevents lumps and scorching on the pan bottom.

Swap the peach

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits about as well
  3. Raisinfits about as well
  4. Peachthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, milk. 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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