Name: Boiled Puddings
Ingredients: 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour; 3 large eggs; ¼ teaspoon salt; 1 to 1 pint milk; fine currant, raspberry, or strawberry jelly

Why it works: Flour and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Boiled Puddings

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and boil

Grease a mold or basin.
Fill it with the pudding mixture.
Boil for 1 hour.

Serve

Cut the top into large dice before serving.
Pour a small jarful of jelly over the pudding.
Serve immediately.

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.

Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together106,462 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Milk + curranttop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together5,475 recipes

Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).
Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together88,785 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Egg + curranttop 26% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together8,734 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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: Eggs set the pudding as they cook, giving it a firm, sliceable structure.
All-purpose flour: Flour thickens the milk and eggs, helping the pudding hold together.
Milk: Milk adds moisture and softness to the set custard.