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Dessert

Macaroni Pudding

A baked dish of macaroni mixed with a custard of milk, eggs, sugar, and flavouring, served with stewed fruit.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 88,785 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Macaroni Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the macaroni

  1. Boil the macaroni in water until tender.

  2. Cut the macaroni into small pieces.

  3. Place the macaroni in a pie dish.

Make the custard

  1. Heat the milk.

  2. Beat the eggs into the milk.

  3. Add sugar and flavouring to the milk and egg mixture.

  4. Pour the custard over the macaroni.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake until set.

  2. Serve with stewed fruit.

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. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

  2. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

  3. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Macaroni
Forms the base body of the pudding, giving it bulk and a soft, starchy structure.
Milk
Provides liquid that forms the custard and keeps the pudding moist as it cooks.
Eggs
Set when baked, binding the custard so the pudding holds its shape.
Sugar
Adds sweetness to the custard.

The step that matters

Bake until set. Egg proteins coagulate as the custard heats, turning liquid into a soft solid. Underbaking leaves it runny, while overbaking can make it curdle and weep, so watch for a set centre.

“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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