Name: Nesselrode Pudding
Ingredients: 2 tablespoons gelatine; 1 quart chocolate custard; sponge cake; sherry wine; mixed preserved and candied fruits

Why it works: Chocolate and sherry work together. They rank in the top 19% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 94 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Nesselrode Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Soak the gelatine in a little cold milk for 1 hour.
Remove the crust from the sponge cake and cut it into slices about ½ inch thick.
Trim the cake slices evenly and soak them in a little sherry wine.
Fit a layer of soaked cake in the bottom of a tin ice-cream mold, ensuring the cover fits well.
On this cake layer, add a layer of mixed preserved and candied fruits.

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.

Chocolate + sherrytop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together94 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
Chocolate + winetop 25% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together284 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
Sherry + winetop 32% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together0 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).