Skip to main content
Dessert

Corn Starch

A custard-like pudding made from corn starch, milk, eggs, and a sweetened sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Corn Starch

Ingredients

Directions

Make the pudding

  1. In a double boiler, stir the corn starch into the heated milk and boil until well cooked.

  2. Remove from heat and gently fold in the beaten egg whites.

  3. Pour the mixture into a mold and let it set.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. For the sauce, heat the ½ pint of milk.

  2. Beat the egg yolks and stir them into the hot milk.

  3. Add sugar, flavoring, and a little cream to the sauce.

  4. Serve the sauce over the corn starch.

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. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  2. Sauce + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Milk + corntop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  4. Sauce + sugartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,147 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 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

Corn starch
Thickens the milk into a set, sliceable pudding as it cooks.
Egg whites
Folded in whole, they add lightness and structure to the pudding.
Egg yolks
Enrich and thicken the sauce, giving it body and a smooth texture.
Milk
Forms the base of both the pudding and the sauce, providing moisture.

The step that matters

Cooking the corn starch in the milk. Corn starch must be boiled fully to gelatinize and thicken; undercooked starch leaves a raw, pasty taste and weak set.

“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.

More cornstarch pudding recipes

Chocolate 13 See all 106 →

You might also like

Corn CakeCorn Cake90 recipesCorn Starch CakeCorn Starch Cake89 recipesCorn CakesCorn Cakes22 recipesGreen Corn PuddingGreen Corn Pudding14 recipes