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Dessert

To Make a Quaking Pudding

A custard-like pudding made with cream, eggs, and flour, boiled in a cloth.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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To Make a Quaking Pudding

Why it works: Cream and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

To Make a Quaking Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Butter a cloth well and dust it with flour.

  2. Ensure the water is boiling before adding the cloth.

Make the custard

  1. Beat the eggs and egg whites well, then mix with the cream.

  2. Add grated nutmeg, salt, and rose water if desired.

  3. Incorporate the crumb of the roll or flour mixed with a little cream.

Boil

  1. Pour the mixture into the cloth, tie it loosely, and boil for 30 minutes.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Nutmeg + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Cream + nutmegtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,920 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Nutmeg + rosetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Eggs
Set the pudding into a firm, sliceable body as they cook.
Cream
Adds richness and moisture, giving the pudding a soft, tender texture.
Roll crumb or flour
Thickens the mixture so it holds together rather than running out of the cloth.

The step that matters

Tying the cloth loosely. The pudding expands slightly as it heats and needs room to swell; a tight tie can squeeze the mixture and affect its texture.

“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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