Skip to main content
Dessert

Viennoise Pudding

A steamed bread pudding with sugar, sultanas, candied peel, lemon rind, eggs, sherry, and milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Viennoise Pudding

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 ↓

Viennoise Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the custard base

  1. Combine diced bread, castor sugar, sultanas, shredded candied peel, and grated lemon rind in a basin.

  2. Combine loaf sugar and 1 teaspoon of water in a saucepan.

  3. Stir the mixture over low heat until it turns dark brown.

  4. Add the milk to the dark brown sugar mixture and stir until dissolved.

  5. Gradually pour the milk mixture into the egg yolks.

  6. Strain the mixture over the bread and dry ingredients in the basin.

  7. Add the sherry and mix well.

Steam and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into a well-greased mold.

  2. Steam for 1.5 hours.

  3. Serve with German 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. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  2. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Milk + sherrytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,479 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3,5-trimethylpyrazine (cocoa, roasted).

  4. Bread + sherrytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together682 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Bread
Forms the body of the pudding and soaks up the custard to set into a soft crumb.
Eggs
Yolks thicken the milk mixture as it cooks, giving the pudding its set structure.
Milk
Provides the liquid that moistens the bread and carries the custard set.
Loaf sugar
Caramelised to a dark brown, adding colour and a deep toffee flavour.
Sultanas
Add chewy sweetness and moisture as they plump during steaming.

The step that matters

Stir the loaf sugar until dark brown. Sugar caramelises quickly once it darkens, so it can turn bitter if overcooked. Stop when it is dark brown and before it smokes, then add the milk carefully.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, sugar, milk, egg, sherry):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, sugar, milk, egg, sherry. 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.

You might also like

Lemon CakeLemon Cake228 recipesBread PuddingBread Pudding153 recipesLemon IceLemon Ice147 recipesLemon SherbetLemon Sherbet103 recipes