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Dessert

Strawberry Tapioca

A baked dessert of tapioca and strawberries sweetened with sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 98,233 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Strawberry Tapioca

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderately hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderately hot oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Soak the tapioca in cold water overnight.

  2. In the morning, butter a baking dish and add half of the soaked tapioca.

Assemble

  1. Sprinkle sugar over the tapioca, then layer with the strawberries and more sugar.

  2. Top with the remaining tapioca and fill the dish with water until it covers the tapioca by about ¼ inch.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until the tapioca looks clear.

  2. Serve cold with cream or custard. Adjust sweetness with more sugar if needed.

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. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Tapioca
Swells and sets as it soaks and bakes, giving the pudding its thick, chewy body.
Strawberries
Provide the main fruit flavour and moisture that softens and blends into the pudding as it bakes.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps balance the tartness of the strawberries.

The step that matters

Covering the tapioca with water before baking. Tapioca absorbs liquid as it bakes and needs enough water to hydrate fully; too little leaves the starch dry and grainy, while the bake sets it into a clear, tender texture.

“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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