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Dessert

Cold Cabinet Pudding

A chilled custard pudding made with sponge biscuits, ratafias, cherries, angelica, and gelatine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Biscuit and angelica share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 69 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Cold Cabinet Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mold

  1. Decorate the bottom of a pint mold with dried cherries and pieces of angelica.

  2. Split the sponge biscuits in half.

  3. Line the sides of the mold with the biscuits and ratafias, alternating their arrangement.

Make the custard

  1. In a bowl, beat the egg yolks with a wooden spoon, then stir in the milk and pour the mixture into a jug.

  2. Fill a saucepan halfway with hot water and bring the water to a boil.

  3. Move the saucepan to the side of the heat and place the jug in the saucepan.

  4. Stir the custard until it thickens to a cream-like consistency, ensuring it does not boil.

  5. In a small pan, melt the gelatine with a tablespoon of water near the fire.

  6. Remove the jug from the saucepan and let it cool.

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. Biscuit + angelicatop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together69 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  3. Angelica + vanillatop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together170 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  4. Vanilla + sugartop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Biscuit + vanillatop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together422 recipes

    Shared aroma: maltol (caramel, sweet).

Vanilla and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Sponge finger biscuits
Form the sturdy lining that holds the shape of the pudding around the mold.
Egg yolks
Thicken the custard as they gently set with heat, giving it a rich texture.
Gelatine
Sets the cooled custard so the pudding holds its shape when turned out.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard, carrying the egg yolks and sugar.
Ratafias
Add almond-like flavor and a crisp, biscuit texture to the mold lining.

The step that matters

Stir the custard until it thickens without boiling. Egg yolks scramble and curdle if overheated, leaving a grainy custard. Gentle heat in a water bath thickens them smoothly into a cream-like texture.

Swap the angelica

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Angelicathe original
  4. Capersfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against biscuit, milk, egg, cream, vanilla, 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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