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 ↓
A George Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the filling
Boil the rice in the milk with the lemon peel until tender.
Drain the rice and mix it with the boiled apples, which should be as dry as possible.
Add the white wine, egg yolks, orange peel, citron, and sugar to the mixture.
Assemble and bake
Line a mold with pastry.
Beat the egg whites until frothy and fold them into the mixture.
Fill the mold and bake until golden brown.
Serve
Serve the pudding upside down with a sauce made from wine, sugar, egg yolks, and butter.
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.
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Lemon + orangetop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together10,634 recipes
Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
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Rice + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,374 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Apple + orangetop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together2,230 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Apple + white winetop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together372 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
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Lemon + white winetop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,832 recipes
Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Egg whites
- Whipped to froth and folded in, they lighten the filling and help it rise and set.
- Egg yolks
- Add richness and help bind the filling as it sets in the oven.
- Whole rice
- Cooked until tender, it gives the pudding body and a soft, starchy texture.
- Apples
- Provide the main fruit flavor and bulk; drying them well keeps the filling from becoming watery.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the browning of the baked crust.
The step that matters
Drain and dry the apples. Excess moisture from the apples thins the filling and can stop it setting firmly, so the apples should be as dry as possible before mixing.
Swap the apple
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, milk, lemon, white wine, egg, orange, sugar):
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits about as well
- Peachfits about as well
- Applethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against rice, milk, lemon, white wine, egg, orange, sugar. 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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