Why it works: Butter and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 118,967 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓
Orange Conserve Fob Puddings
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the oranges
Wash and soak the oranges in spring water for three days, changing the water morning and night.
Boil the oranges until tender enough to pierce with a pin, then drain and weigh them.
Make the conserve
For each pound of oranges, use 2 cups of sugar, reducing it to fine powder.
Cut the oranges in half, remove the seeds and coarse skin, then beat them with the sugar in a large bowl.
Pick out any bits of fiber or coarse skin that cannot be reduced to a paste.
Once smooth, transfer the conserve to small jars for storage; it requires no boiling.
Make cheesecakes or pudding
To make cheesecakes or pudding, mix 2 tablespoons of conserve with the yolks of 5 or 6 eggs, 2 ounces of sugar, and 2 tablespoons of clarified butter until well combined.
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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Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together98,233 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Orange + sugartop 20% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together19,212 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Orange + buttertop 23% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,301 recipes
Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Orange and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 19,212 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
- Seville oranges
- Provide the bulk of the conserve, with their peel and pulp giving it body and bitter aroma.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the conserve and, with the fruit, helps preserve it in storage.
- Egg yolks
- Add richness and help bind and set the cheesecake or pudding filling.
- Clarified butter
- Adds fat and richness to the cheesecake or pudding mixture.
The step that matters
Beating the oranges to a smooth paste. Any remaining coarse skin or fiber leaves a stringy texture, so the fruit must be beaten fully smooth and bits picked out before jarring.
Swap the orange
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, egg):
- Vanillafits better
- Lemonfits better
- Raisinfits better
- Orangethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, egg. 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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