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Dessert

To Make a Cream Pudding

A custard-like dessert made with cream, eggs, almonds, spices, and flavored with orange flower or rose water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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To Make a Cream Pudding

Why it works: Nutmeg and almond match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,115 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

To Make a Cream Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard base

  1. Boil the cream with the mace and grated nutmeg.

  2. Let the cream cool.

  3. Beat the eggs and egg whites.

  4. Strain the beaten eggs and egg whites.

  5. Mix the flour with the eggs.

  6. Add the ground almonds and orange-flower or rose-water.

  7. Gradually mix in the cooled cream.

  8. Beat everything together.

Boil the pudding

  1. Wet and flour a thick cloth.

  2. Pour the mixture into the cloth.

  3. Tie the cloth closed.

  4. Boil for 30 minutes in fast-boiling water.

Serve

  1. Turn the pudding out onto a dish.

  2. Pour melted butter over it.

  3. Pour a little sweet wine over it.

  4. Sprinkle with fine sugar.

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. Nutmeg + almondtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,115 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Almond + orangetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,125 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

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

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 a soft, moist texture to the pudding.
Flour
Helps thicken the mixture so it holds together when boiled.
Blanched almonds
Add body, nutty flavour and a tender, slightly grainy texture.
Egg whites
Add lift and help the pudding set lighter in texture.

The step that matters

Tie the cloth closed. If the cloth is not sealed tightly and kept wet and floured, water can enter and the pudding can become soggy or fall apart. The floured cloth also forms a skin that helps the pudding hold its shape while it boils.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, nutmeg, egg, flour, almond, orange, butter):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, nutmeg, egg, flour, almond, orange, butter. 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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