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Dessert

Cabinet Pudding

A steamed custard pudding made with sponge cake, biscuits, milk, cream, sherry, and ratafias, served with German sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 ↓

Cabinet Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mold

  1. Butter a plain round mold and decorate it with glace cherries and angelica.

Make the custard

  1. Dissolve the sugar in the milk and pour it onto the beaten eggs.

  2. Add the sherry to the custard and strain it into the mold.

Fill and steam

  1. Fill the mold with slices of sponge cake mixed with ratafias and macaroons.

  2. Cover with greased paper and steam gently for one hour.

Serve

  1. Let it stand for two to three minutes before turning it out and serve with German sauce.

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

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

  3. Milk + sherrytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,479 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3,5-trimethylpyrazine (cocoa, roasted).

  4. Biscuit + creamtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,235 recipes

    Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).

  5. Biscuit + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set the custard so it holds its shape when steamed and turned out.
Sponge buns
Form the bulk of the pudding and soak up the custard as it steams.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard that binds the cake pieces together.
Cream
Adds richness and a smoother, softer texture to the custard.
Macaroon biscuits
Add a chewy, almond-flavoured sweetness that soaks up custard.
Sherry
Adds aroma and a warm, fruity flavour to the custard.

The step that matters

Steaming gently for one hour. Eggs in the custard set when heated, but high heat or boiling water can make them curdle and turn the pudding spongy or watery. Gentle steam sets the custard evenly through the cake.

Swap the angelica

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, biscuit, cream, sherry, sugar, 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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