Why it works: Bread and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,466 recipes. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. The science ↓
Marrow 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.
Make the mixture
Combine bread crumbs and boiling milk in a bowl.
Add thinly sliced marrow and washed currants, then mix well until combined.
Bake
Pour mixture into a greased baking dish.
Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until set.
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.
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Bread + milktop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together11,466 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
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Milk + curranttop 16% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together5,475 recipes
Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).
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Bread + curranttop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,398 recipes
Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Bread crumbs
- Absorb the hot milk and swell, giving the pudding its soft body and structure.
- Boiling milk
- Softens the crumbs and supplies the liquid that the pudding becomes moist and tender with.
- Marrow
- Adds richness and fat, giving the pudding its savoury flavour and silky texture.
- Currants
- Add sweetness and chewy pockets of fruit flavour throughout the pudding.
The step that matters
Bake until set, not longer. The crumbs firm up as they absorb milk and cool. Stop when the top springs back and the centre no longer looks wet. Overbaking dries the crumbs and tightens the texture, while underbaking leaves the middle loose and soupy.
Swap the currant
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, milk):
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits better
- Applefits better
- Currantthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against bread, milk. 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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