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Dessert

Alexandra Puddings

A baked apple pudding with lemon rind, sugar, butter, eggs, bread crumbs, milk, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,318 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Alexandra Puddings

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare the apples

  1. Peel, core, and slice the apples.

  2. In a pan, combine the apples, lemon rind, sugar, and 1 tablespoon of water.

  3. Simmer until it becomes a pulp.

  4. Stir in the butter.

  5. Allow the mixture to cool.

Make the pudding

  1. Beat the eggs.

  2. Add the beaten eggs to the apple mixture along with the bread crumbs, milk, and a little nutmeg.

  3. Mix thoroughly.

  4. Pour the mixture into greased dariole molds.

  5. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for twenty minutes.

Serve

  1. Turn the puddings out onto a glass dish.

  2. Dust with sugar.

  3. Serve.

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

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

  2. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  4. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  5. Apple + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,104 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

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

What each ingredient does

Apples
Break down into a pulp that gives the pudding its moist, sweet body.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and set during baking to give the pudding its structure.
Bread crumbs
Soak up liquid and add body, helping the pudding hold its shape.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, giving a softer, more tender texture.
Milk
Adds moisture and softness to the custard-like mixture.

The step that matters

Cool the apple mixture before adding the eggs. If the hot apple pulp meets the beaten eggs, the eggs can begin to scramble and curdle, leaving a grainy texture instead of a smooth, set pudding.

Swap the apple

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Peachfits about as well
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lemon, sugar, butter, egg, bread, milk, 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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