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Dessert

Potato Pudding

A baked dessert made from boiled potatoes, butter, eggs, sugar, and lemon, served cold.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,230 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Potato Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the potato base

  1. Boil the potatoes until white, mealy, and very tender.

  2. Rub the potatoes through a colander while hot.

  3. Mix in the butter until well combined.

Make the filling

  1. Beat the yolks of the eggs with the sugar until smooth.

  2. Add the lemon rind and juice, then fold in the beaten egg whites.

  3. Pour the mixture into pie plates lined with pastry.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake at 400°F (200°C) until set and lightly browned.

  2. Serve cold.

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. Potato + lemontop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,230 recipes

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

  2. Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

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

  3. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Provide the bulk of the filling, giving a soft, smooth body when riced while hot.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, giving a softer, more tender texture to the pudding.
Eggs
Set during baking to give structure, and the whites add lightness to the mixture.
Fine sugar
Adds sweetness and helps make the yolks smooth and the custard tender.
Lemon
Its rind and juice add aroma and acidity that brighten the sweet filling.

The step that matters

Bake until set and lightly browned. Egg proteins set as they heat, so underbaking leaves the filling runny, while overbaking can make it dry and rubbery. Watch for a firm centre and light browning.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Asparagusfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Potatothe original

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

More potato pudding recipes

Sweet 116Irish 14Brandy 9Baked 7Cottage 6Lemon 5 See all 236 →

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