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Iced Pudding a LA Charles Kemble

A chilled pineapple and raisin pudding made with cream, egg yolks, sugar, corn flour, and kirschwasser.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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Why it works: Pineapple and vanilla match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 911 recipes. Both carry ethyl isobutyrate, which smells fruity, ethereal. The science ↓

Iced Pudding a LA Charles Kemble

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Combine the cream, egg yolks, pineapple syrup, sugar, corn flour, and vanilla sugar in a bowl.

  2. Mix in the kirschwasser and freeze the mixture until firm.

Finish and freeze

  1. Once frozen, fold in the diced pineapple, Sultana raisins, and whipped cream.

  2. Mold the mixture into a desired shape and return to the freezer until ready to serve.

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. Pineapple + vanillatop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together911 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

  2. Syrup + sugartop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,842 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

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

  4. Corn + vanillatop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,943 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  5. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

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

Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, creamy texture to the frozen mixture.
Egg yolks
Add richness and help emulsify and thicken the base for a smooth frozen texture.
Sugar
Sweetens the pudding and softens the frozen texture so it is not rock hard.
Corn flour
Thickens the base and gives body to the mixture as it sets.
Whipped double cream
Lightens the texture and adds airiness to the finished frozen pudding.

The step that matters

Freezing the base until firm. The base must freeze evenly and reach a firm but not rock-hard state before folding in the fruit and whipped cream. Stirring or checking during freezing helps prevent large ice crystals and keeps the texture smooth.

Swap the pineapple

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

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Coconutfits better
  4. Pineapplethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, egg, syrup, sugar, corn, flour, vanilla. 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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