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Dessert

Ice Corn Starch Pudding

A cold pudding made from milk, corn starch, eggs, and optional salt, served with powdered sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and corn are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,955 recipes. Both carry hexanal, which smells green, grassy. The science ↓

Ice Corn Starch Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cream

  1. Let the cream rise from the milk for a few hours.

  2. Set the risen cream aside in a cool place.

Make the pudding

  1. Mix 4 heaping tablespoons of corn starch with a little cold skimmed milk and the beaten eggs.

  2. Heat 1 quart of skimmed milk in a thick-lined saucepan until it boils.

  3. Quickly mix the boiling milk with the corn starch and egg mixture, stirring smoothly.

  4. Allow the mixture to boil once.

  5. Pour the boiled mixture into a wet mold or small oval dishes to prevent sticking.

  6. Set the molded pudding aside in a cool place to firm up.

Serve

  1. Serve the pudding with the reserved cream and powdered sugar.

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. Milk + corntop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

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

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

  3. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

  4. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  5. Corn + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,168 recipes

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

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Corn starch
Thickens the milk and egg mixture into a set, creamy pudding as it boils.
Eggs
Add richness and help set the pudding along with the starch.
Milk
Forms the body of the pudding and carries the flavor.

The step that matters

Quickly mix the boiling milk with the corn starch and egg mixture, stirring smoothly. Adding boiling milk to the starch and egg mixture must be done quickly while stirring, so the starch disperses evenly and the eggs do not curdle into lumps. Smooth mixing gives an even, silky set.

“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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