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Dessert

Cheese Pudding

A savory cheese pudding baked in puff pastry, made with grated Cheshire cheese, eggs, clarified butter, cream, and bread crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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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 ↓

Cheese Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Line a small dish with puff pastry.

Make the custard

  1. In a bowl, mix the grated cheese, eggs, clarified butter, cream, and bread crumbs.

  2. Season with mustard, salt, and pepper.

  3. Pour the mixture into the lined dish.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake until set and golden brown.

  2. Serve warm.

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

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

  2. Cheese + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,130 recipes

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

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  4. Cheese + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

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

  5. Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Cheshire cheese
Provides the main flavour and, as it melts and sets, the body of the filling.
Eggs
Set when baked, giving the pudding its firm, custard-like structure.
Cream
Adds richness and moisture, keeping the filling smooth rather than dry.
Clarified butter
Adds fat for richness and helps the filling brown evenly in the oven.
Bread crumbs
Absorb some of the liquid and help the filling hold its shape as it sets.

The step that matters

Bake until set and golden brown. Egg proteins set with heat, so underbaking leaves the filling runny while overbaking makes it dry and grainy. Look for a firm centre and an even golden top.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cheese, egg, butter, cream, bread, pepper):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cheese, egg, butter, cream, bread, pepper. 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.

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