Name: Sweetmeat Pudding
Ingredients: 1 ounce candied orange peel; 1 ounce candied lemon peel; 1 ounce citron; 8 egg yolks; 2 egg whites; ½ pound sugar; ½ pound melted butter; thin puff pastry

Why it works: Orange and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Sweetmeat Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA gentle oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a gentle oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Cover your dish with a thin layer of puff pastry.
Slice the candied orange peel, lemon peel, and citron thinly, and lay them over the bottom of the dish.

Make the custard

Beat the egg yolks and egg whites together.
Mix in the sugar and melted butter until well combined.
Pour the mixture over the sweetmeats in the dish.

Bake

Bake for about 1 hour until set.

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.

Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together10,634 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Lemon + buttertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,227 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together118,967 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together98,233 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

Lemon and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Egg yolks: Thicken the custard and add richness as they set in the oven.
Egg whites: Help the custard set and give it a lighter structure.
Melted butter: Adds richness and a tender texture to the set custard.
Sugar: Adds sweetness and helps the custard brown lightly.
Candied orange peel: Adds sweet, bitter citrus flavour and chewy texture in the base.