Why it works: Milk and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 88,785 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Tapioca Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the tapioca
Soak the tapioca until it swells.
Make the pudding
Add the milk and sugar to taste, and bring to a boil.
In a separate bowl, beat the eggs with a little cold milk.
Add the egg mixture to the boiling tapioca and milk.
Finish and mold
Flavor as desired and mold the pudding.
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.
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Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 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
- Tapioca
- Thickens the pudding as its starch swells and sets when heated in the milk.
- Milk
- Forms the liquid base that gives the pudding its body and richness.
- Eggs
- Set when heated, thickening the pudding and adding richness.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness to the pudding.
The step that matters
Adding the egg mixture to the boiling tapioca and milk. Eggs thicken by setting when heated, so they can curdle or form lumps if they hit a very hot mixture unevenly. Stirring the egg mixture in steadily helps it blend in and thicken the pudding smoothly.
“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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