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Dessert

Biscuit-Puddings

A pudding made from grated Naples biscuits, milk, eggs, nutmeg, brandy, flour, and sugar, baked in a buttered basin.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Biscuit and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 368 recipes. Both carry maltol, which smells caramel, sweet. The science ↓

Biscuit-Puddings

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mixture

  1. Pour boiling milk or cream over grated biscuits.

  2. Cover until cold.

  3. Add egg yolks, egg whites, nutmeg, brandy, flour, and sugar.

  4. Mix well.

Cook and serve

  1. Butter a basin.

  2. Pour in the mixture.

  3. Boil for 1 hour.

  4. Serve with wine 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.

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. Biscuit + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together368 recipes

    Shared aroma: maltol (caramel, sweet).

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Nutmeg + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Biscuit + flourtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together889 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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

Naples biscuits
Form the body of the pudding, soaking up the hot milk or cream to become soft.
Egg yolks
Enrich the custard and help it set into a tender, creamy texture.
Egg whites
Add airy lightness and help the pudding rise and hold its shape.
Milk or cream
Softens the biscuits and provides moisture for a smooth, rich texture.
Flour
Thickens the mixture slightly and gives it more body as it cooks.

The step that matters

Boil for 1 hour. Cooking the pudding gently and for the full time lets the egg proteins set into a firm, sliceable body. Too little time leaves it runny, while too much heat can make the eggs curdle and turn grainy.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (biscuit, milk, egg, brandy, flour, sugar, butter):

  1. Cinnamonfits about as well
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Capersfits less well
  4. Allspicefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against biscuit, milk, egg, brandy, flour, sugar, 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.

More biscuit pudding recipes

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