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Dessert

Ground Rice Pudding

A sweet pudding made from ground rice, milk, sugar, lemon zest, cinnamon, bay leaf, butter, eggs, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Ground Rice Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the rice base

  1. In a saucepan, gradually mix 6 ounces of fresh-ground rice with 2 pints of new milk, stirring well.

  2. Add the grated zest of 1/2 lemon, a lump of sugar, a small piece of cinnamon, and a dried bay leaf tied in muslin.

  3. Cook over low heat until thickened.

  4. Remove from heat.

  5. Take out the spice bag.

  6. Beat the pudding with a wooden spoon until smooth.

  7. Stir in 1 ounce of butter and 4 ounces of lump sugar until dissolved.

Add the eggs and bake

  1. Pour the mixture into a baking dish.

  2. In a bowl, beat 6 eggs with a small pinch of salt and 1/2 cup of milk.

  3. When the rice mixture is slightly warm, strain the egg mixture into it.

  4. Mix well.

  5. Grate nutmeg over the top.

  6. Bake in a 300°F (150°C) oven until set, ensuring it does not boil.

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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Rice + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,137 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

  4. Lemon + cinnamontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,950 recipes

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Rice
Forms the thick body of the pudding as it cooks and absorbs the milk.
Milk
Provides the liquid that the rice softens in and sets into a creamy custard.
Eggs
Set during baking to give the pudding its firm, custard-like structure.
Butter
Adds richness and a smoother, softer texture to the finished pudding.
Sugar
Sweetens the pudding and helps give it a tender texture.

The step that matters

Bake until set without boiling. Eggs thicken as they heat, but if the custard gets too hot it can curdle and turn grainy. Baking gently until just set keeps the texture smooth and creamy.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, milk, sugar, cinnamon, butter, egg, nutmeg):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Coconutfits about as well
  3. Raisinfits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, milk, sugar, cinnamon, butter, egg, 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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