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Dessert

Carrot Pudding

A baked custard made with carrot, biscuits, eggs, cream, and flavored with ratafia and orange or rose water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and orange match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 737 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Carrot Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare the filling

  1. Boil the carrot until tender, then mash it in a bowl.

  2. Mix in the biscuit powder or crushed biscuits.

  3. Add the egg yolks, egg whites, cream, ratafia, orange or rose water, grated nutmeg, and sugar, then stir until well combined.

Bake and serve

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Line a shallow dish with pastry and pour the mixture into it.

  3. Bake for about 30-40 minutes or until set.

  4. Let it cool slightly.

  5. Turn it out onto a serving plate and dust with sugar before serving.

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. Carrot + orangetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together737 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Biscuit + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together368 recipes

    Shared aroma: maltol (caramel, sweet).

  3. Carrot + nutmegtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,424 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  4. Orange + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,746 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Carrot
Provides the bulk and soft, moist body of the pudding once mashed.
Egg yolks
Enrich the custard and help it set firm when baked.
Egg whites
Add structure and lightness, helping the pudding hold its shape as it sets.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, tender texture to the custard.
Biscuit powder
Absorbs liquid and gives the filling a light body and subtle crumb.

The step that matters

Bake until just set. Eggs thicken as they heat, so removing the pudding once the centre is just set keeps it tender. Overbaking makes the egg proteins tighten and turn it grainy or watery.

Swap the carrot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (biscuit, egg, cream, orange, nutmeg, sugar):

  1. Arrowrootfits better
  2. Sweet potatofits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Carrotthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against biscuit, egg, cream, orange, nutmeg, 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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