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Dessert

Tapioca Pudding

A sweet pudding made from tapioca, milk, eggs, and apples or peaches, flavored with vanilla or nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Tapioca Pudding

Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Tapioca Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the tapioca

  1. Soak the tapioca until tender.

  2. Cook the tapioca until it is like jelly; sweeten and flavor to taste.

Assemble and bake

  1. Line a pudding dish with sliced apples, then pour the tapioca over them.

  2. Cook until the apples are soft.

  3. In a separate bowl, mix the milk, cornstarch, and eggs, then pour this mixture over the apples.

  4. If using peaches, follow the same steps.

  5. For added flavor, you can sprinkle vanilla or nutmeg on top.

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. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

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

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

  3. Apple + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,501 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Milk + appletop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,104 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Tapioca
Swells and thickens into a jelly-like pudding base as it cooks.
Eggs
Help set the milk custard topping and add richness.
Milk
Forms the creamy liquid that sets with the eggs and cornstarch.
Cornstarch
Thickens the milk mixture so it sets smoothly.
Apples
Provide tartness and soft fruit flavor beneath the pudding.

“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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Apple 146Cream 36Pineapple 22Lemon 21Peach 15Baked 14 See all 530 →

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