Name: Baked Batter Pudding, with or Without Fruit
Ingredients: 6 tablespoons dried flour; ¾ pint cold milk; ¾ pint boiling milk; 3 ounces moist sugar; 2 eggs; butter for greasing; currants or raisins (optional); 1 ounce sugar (if using fresh fruit)

Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Baked Batter Pudding, with or Without Fruit

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

Mix the flour with the cold milk until smooth.
Add the boiling milk and moist sugar, then boil for 10 minutes while stirring continuously.
Let the mixture cool, then add the beaten eggs.

Bake

Grease a pie dish, pour in the mixture, and bake at 400°F (200°C) for 30 minutes.
If using fresh fruit, add 1 ounce of sugar and bake for 1 hour.

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.

Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together92,116 recipes

Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together106,462 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Flour: Thickens the milk into a smooth, set batter as it cooks.
Eggs: Set during baking to give the pudding structure and a custard-like body.
Milk: Provides the liquid base and moisture that the flour and eggs set into a tender pudding.
Moist sugar: Adds sweetness and a softer, slightly caramel flavour to the batter.

The step that matters

Let the mixture cool before adding the eggs. Eggs added to very hot milk can scramble or cook unevenly instead of blending smoothly. Letting the mixture cool first lets the eggs mix in evenly so the batter sets into a uniform pudding.

Swap the currant

The recipe marks currant as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, milk, sugar, egg, butter):

Vanillafits better
Raisinfits better
Figfits better
Currantthe original

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

Red Currant Jelly65 recipes

Currant Ice Cream32 recipes

Currant Sherbet9 recipes

Currant and Raspberry Ice7 recipes

Like knowing why a recipe works?

The free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.

Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.

Baked Batter Pudding, with or Without Fruit