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Dessert

Lemon Pudding

A steamed lemon custard made with lemon juice, rind, breadcrumbs, sugar, butter, egg yolks, and folded egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,227 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Lemon Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Preheat your steamer or pot of boiling water.

  2. In a bowl, combine the lemon juice, lemon rind, breadcrumbs, sugar, and butter.

  3. Add the yolks of the eggs and mix well.

Make and steam

  1. In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form, then gently fold them into the mixture.

  2. Pour the mixture into a mold and steam for 2.5 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.

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. Lemon + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  5. Lemon + eggtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together44,316 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

Lemon and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Breadcrumbs
Provide the body of the pudding and absorb the liquid from the butter and lemon.
Egg whites
Whipped to stiff peaks, they lighten the mixture and help it rise and set softly.
Egg yolks
Add richness and help bind the mixture into a smooth, set pudding.
Butter
Adds fat for a tender, rich texture and a soft mouthfeel.
Sugar
Sweetens the pudding and balances the sharpness of the lemon.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Stiff whites hold air that gives the pudding its lightness. Stirring them vigorously deflates the foam, so fold gently with a spatula until just combined.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Lemonthe original
  3. Raisinfits about as well
  4. Figfits about as well

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