Skip to main content
Dessert

Baked Indian Pudding

A baked pudding made from milk, Indian meal, eggs, sugar, molasses, salt, and cinnamon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Baked Indian Pudding

Why it works: Milk and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 12,655 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Baked Indian Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the custard base

  1. Boil 1 quart of milk.

  2. Stir in 1/2 cup of Indian meal.

  3. Cool the mixture.

  4. Add the remaining milk.

  5. Add 2 beaten eggs.

  6. Add 1/2 cup sugar.

  7. Add 1/2 cup molasses.

  8. Add 1/4 teaspoon salt.

  9. Add 1 teaspoon cinnamon.

Bake

  1. Pour the mixture into a baking dish.

  2. Bake in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) for 2 hours.

  3. If you want a jellied texture, add 1/2 cup of cold milk after 1 hour of baking.

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 + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Molasses + cinnamontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,928 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Milk
Forms the liquid base that cooks with the meal into a soft pudding.
Indian meal
Cornmeal that thickens the milk and gives the pudding its body.
Eggs
Set during baking to give the pudding a firm, custard-like structure.
Molasses
Adds deep sweetness, dark color and a rich caramel flavor.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the molasses and spice.

The step that matters

Cool the mixture before adding the eggs. Adding beaten eggs to very hot milk can scramble them and leave lumps. Cooling the cornmeal mixture first lets the eggs blend smoothly and set evenly in the oven.

“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.

More indian pudding recipes

Baked 36Boiled 26Steamed 12Apple 8New England 4Plain 4 See all 344 →

You might also like

Molasses CookiesMolasses Cookies96 recipesMolasses CakeMolasses Cake90 recipesCinnamon RollsCinnamon Rolls71 recipesCinnamon CakeCinnamon Cake42 recipes