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Dessert

Pineapple Tapioca Pudding

A sweet pudding made from tapioca, pineapple, sugar, and beaten egg whites, baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Pineapple Tapioca Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the tapioca

  1. Wash the tapioca thoroughly in several waters and soak it in cold water overnight.

  2. In a granite kettle, combine the soaked tapioca and the soaking water; cook until clear.

Make the pudding

  1. Add the salt, sugar, and grated pineapple; cook for 30 minutes, stirring often to prevent scorching.

  2. Transfer to a serving dish.

Top, bake and serve

  1. Beat the egg whites until light; gradually add 4 tablespoons of sugar while beating.

  2. Pile the beaten egg whites on top of the pudding and place in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) with the door open for 10 minutes. Close the oven door and let it brown.

  3. Serve with cream.

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 + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Sugar + pineappletop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,841 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Egg + creamtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Pineapple + creamtop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,574 recipes

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

Egg and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 42,166 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 turns clear as it cooks, giving the pudding its thick, translucent body.
Egg whites
Whipped into a light foam that bakes to a golden, airy topping.
Granulated sugar
Sweetens the pudding and helps the meringue-style topping brown.
Grated pineapple
Adds fruit flavor and acidity, and its juice adds moisture to the pudding.

The step that matters

Cooking the tapioca until clear. Tapioca must cook long enough to fully hydrate and turn translucent; stirring often prevents the starch and sugar from sticking and scorching on the base of the pan.

Swap the pineapple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, egg, cream):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Strawberryfits better
  4. Pineapplethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, cream. 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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