Skip to main content
Dessert

Almond Pudding

A custard-like pudding made with bread crumbs, cream, almonds, eggs, sugar, butter, and brandy, baked in puff pastry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Almond and orange are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,125 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Almond Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the base

  1. Pour boiling cream over bread crumbs and let cool.

  2. Gradually mix in pounded sweet and bitter almonds with orange-flower water or spring water.

Make the custard

  1. Stir in beaten egg yolks, egg whites, sifted sugar, and clarified butter.

  2. Cook the mixture in a clean saucepan over low heat, stirring constantly until thick but do not let it boil.

  3. Once cool, add brandy or noyeau.

Bake

  1. Pour the mixture into a dish lined with puff pastry and bake for 30 minutes at 350°F (175°C).

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. Almond + orangetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,125 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

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

  5. Almond + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

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

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Sweet almonds
Provide the main nutty flavour and the body of the filling.
Egg yolks
Thicken the mixture and add richness when cooked gently.
Egg whites
Add lightness and help the pudding set when baked.
Bread crumbs
Soak up the boiling cream and help give the pudding body.
Clarified butter
Adds richness and a smooth, silky texture.
Sugar
Sweetens the pudding and helps it brown in the oven.

The step that matters

Cooking the mixture over low heat. Egg yolks thicken as they warm, but if the mixture boils they can curdle and turn grainy. Low heat with constant stirring keeps the custard smooth.

Swap the orange

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Apricotfits better
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, cream, almond, egg, sugar, butter, brandy. 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.

More almond pudding recipes

Baked 26Boiled 20Lemon 13Chocolate 6Chestnut 5Frozen 3 See all 210 →

You might also like

Orange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipesBread PuddingBread Pudding153 recipesOrange Cream Rice PuddingOrange Cream Rice Pudding121 recipesOrange GelatinOrange Gelatin100 recipes