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Dessert

Leicester Pudding

A steamed pudding made with milk, cake crumbs, butter, eggs, sugar, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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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 ↓

Leicester Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Melt the butter, then mix all the ingredients together, ensuring the eggs are well beaten to create a rich batter.

  2. Pour the mixture into one large greased mold or several small molds.

Steam and cool

  1. Steam until completely set.

  2. If using a large mold, let it cool, then cut into slices.

Fry and serve

  1. Cover the slices with egg and bread crumbs, then fry in boiling fat.

  2. Serve with jam sauce.

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 + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour 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

Eggs
Set the batter into a firm, sliceable custard and bind the mixture.
Flour
Adds structure so the pudding holds its shape when sliced and fried.
Milk or cream
Provides liquid and moisture for a tender, rich batter.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a soft, delicate texture.
Castor sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the savoury frying step.

The step that matters

Steam until completely set. Egg proteins set gently at moderate heat. Steaming gently keeps the custard smooth and tender, while overly vigorous heat can make it rubbery or pocked with holes. Check that the centre is fully firm before cooling and slicing.

“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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