Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓
Pineapple Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the base
Cut the pineapple into small pieces and place in a pie dish with a little syrup.
Melt the butter in a saucepan and mix in the flour until smooth.
Gradually add the milk while stirring continuously and cook for 5 minutes.
Remove from heat, add 1 oz of sugar and a little syrup, and let cool.
Beat in the egg yolks, then pour the mixture over the pineapple.
Bake and top
Bake in the oven until set.
Beat the egg whites to stiff peaks, add the castor sugar, and pile it roughly on top.
Sift sugar over the top and bake for 20 minutes, or until crisp.
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.
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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Milk + pineappletop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together885 recipes
Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).
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Flour + milktop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
Butter and flour 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
- Egg yolks thicken the custard and the whites form a light, airy meringue topping.
- Flour
- Flour thickens the milk mixture with the melted butter, giving the custard body.
- Butter
- Butter adds richness and flavour to the base and helps the flour mix smoothly.
- Milk
- Milk forms the liquid of the custard, which sets when baked.
- Sugar
- Sugar sweetens the custard and the meringue and helps the topping crisp when baked.
The step that matters
Beat the egg whites to stiff peaks. Egg whites need to be whipped until they hold stiff peaks so the topping stays airy and bakes into a light, crisp meringue rather than collapsing into the custard.
Swap the pineapple
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, egg, flour, milk):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Figfits better
- Pineapplethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, flour, milk. 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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