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Dessert

Honey Pudding

A sweet custard-like dessert made with honey, butter, bread crumbs, and egg yolks, baked in a water bath.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Honey Pudding

Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Honey Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Combine honey and butter in a bowl.

  2. Heat the mixture until creamy.

  3. Add bread crumbs and beat the mixture for 10 minutes.

  4. Incorporate the egg yolks and mix well.

Cook

  1. Pour the mixture into a mold.

  2. Boil in water for 1.5 hours.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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

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

  2. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Honey + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,327 recipes

    Shared aroma: anethole (sweet, anise).

  4. Honey + breadtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together64 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Bind the mixture and set into a firm, sliceable pudding as they cook.
Bread crumbs
Add body and absorb the butter and honey to give the pudding structure.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, creamy texture.
Honey
Provides sweetness and moisture, and adds its distinctive flavour.

The step that matters

Boil in water for 1.5 hours. The mold must stay submerged in gently simmering water for the full time so the egg yolks set evenly. Boiling too hard or letting the water run low can leave the pudding uneven or cracked.

“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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