Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and 27,232 recipes mention both. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
Queen of Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare the base
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Beat the egg yolks and 1 cup of sugar together.
Add the milk and then the bread crumbs to the mixture.
Pour the mixture into a well-greased pudding dish.
Bake and top
Bake until firm.
Remove from the oven and cover with thin slices of crabapple jelly.
Make icing by beating the egg whites with 1 cup of sugar until stiff.
Spread the icing over the jelly and return to the oven to brown.
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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.
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Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together11,466 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
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Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together22,662 recipes
Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
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Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Eggs
- Yolks thicken the custard base while whites whip into a stiff icing that sets and browns.
- Bread crumbs
- Absorb the milk and egg mixture, giving the pudding body and a soft, tender crumb.
- Milk
- Provides the liquid that the eggs set in, giving the pudding its moist texture.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the pudding and helps the beaten egg whites stay stable as a meringue icing.
- Crabapple jelly
- Adds tart, fruity flavour and a glossy layer that contrasts with the sweet icing.
The step that matters
Beating the egg whites for the icing until stiff. Whites must be beaten until they hold firm peaks; under-whipped whites won't stand up and brown properly, and any trace of yolk or fat in the bowl prevents them from whipping to full volume.
“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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