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Dessert

Potato Pudding

A sweet potato pudding made with butter, eggs, sugar, lemon, and baked in a pie crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,230 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Potato Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the potatoes

  1. Boil the potatoes until white, mealy, and very tender.

  2. Rub the potatoes through a colander while hot.

  3. In a bowl, mix the hot potato with the butter until well combined.

Make the custard

  1. Beat the egg yolks with the sugar until smooth.

  2. Add the grated lemon rind and juice to the egg mixture.

  3. Gently fold in the beaten egg whites.

  4. Combine the potato mixture with the egg mixture and stir lightly.

Bake and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into pie plates lined with pie crust.

  2. Bake at 350°F (175°C) until set and lightly golden.

  3. Let cool and serve cold.

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. Potato + lemontop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,230 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  2. Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Provide the bulk and a smooth, starchy body that sets into a soft pudding.
Butter
Adds richness and a tender, smooth texture to the potato base.
Egg yolks
Enrich the filling and help it set into a creamy, custard-like texture.
Egg whites
Add air and lightness, so the filling is less dense after baking.
Fine sugar
Sweetens the filling and softens its texture.
Lemon
Adds acidity and aroma that brighten the sweet, rich filling.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Egg whites hold air only while it is trapped; stirring them in hard deflates the foam and makes the pudding dense. Fold gently so the lightness survives baking.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, egg, sugar, lemon):

  1. Asparagusfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, egg, sugar, lemon. 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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