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Dessert

Brandy Pudding

A steamed pudding made with brandy, cream, milk, eggs, stale French roll, macaroons, sugar, lemon rind, nutmeg, and cherries.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Brandy Pudding

Why it works: Lemon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,318 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Brandy Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mold

  1. Grease a mold and decorate it with halved cherries.

  2. Line the mold with thin slices of the stale French roll.

Fill and set

  1. Fill the mold with alternate layers of macaroons and sliced roll, adding a few cherries, brandy, and a little sugar.

  2. In a bowl, mix the eggs, cream, and milk, then add sugar, lemon rind, and a little nutmeg.

  3. Pour the mixture into the mold.

  4. Let it stand for 1 hour, then steam gently for 30 minutes.

Serve

  1. Serve with a suitable 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.

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. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

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

  3. Cream + nutmegtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,920 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  4. Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

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

  5. Milk + nutmegtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,685 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set the custard and bind the layers into a firm, sliceable pudding.
Cream
Adds richness and a silky, tender texture to the custard.
Milk
Thins the custard and adds moisture that soaks into the bread.
Stale french roll
Forms the absorbent structure that soaks up the custard as it steams.
Macaroons or ratafias
Add almond-like flavour and a chewy, crumbly texture between the layers.
Brandy
Adds a warm, aromatic flavour that carries through the pudding.

The step that matters

Let it stand before steaming. Standing lets the custard soak fully into the bread and macaroons, so the pudding sets evenly rather than leaving dry pockets or a watery base.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against brandy, cream, milk, egg, sugar, nutmeg. 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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