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Dessert

Berry Padding

A steamed dessert made with milk, eggs, berries, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Berry Padding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, combine milk, eggs, salt, and enough flour to create a stiff batter.

  2. Gently fold in the berries.

Steam and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into a steaming dish.

  2. Steam for 2.5 hours until cooked through.

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 + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

Eggs
Bind the batter and help it set firm as it cooks.
Flour
Thickens the batter so it holds its shape around the berries.
Milk
Adds moisture and softness to the batter as it cooks.
Berries
Provide moisture, sweetness and flavor throughout the pudding.

The step that matters

Folding in the berries gently. Vigorous stirring breaks the berries and overworks the batter, turning the pudding streaky and dense instead of light and evenly studded with fruit.

“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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