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Rum Filling

A sweet filling made with egg whites, yolks, sugar, butter, pecans, and sherry and rum.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Sherry and rum match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 146 recipes. Both carry ethyl isobutyrate, which smells fruity, ethereal. The science ↓

Rum Filling

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a bowl, combine egg whites and sugar.

  2. Add egg yolks and butter, then mix well.

  3. Place the bowl over steam and cook until thick, stirring constantly.

  4. Remove from heat and stir in chopped pecans.

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. Sherry + rumtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together146 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

  2. Butter + pecanstop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,416 recipes

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

  3. Butter + rumtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,007 recipes

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

  4. Butter + sherrytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,505 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Sugar + rumtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,908 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg whites
Whisked with sugar and gently cooked, they set and give the filling its light, thickened structure.
Egg yolks
Thicken as they cook and add richness and a smooth, custard-like body.
Butter
Adds fat that enriches the texture and gives the filling a smooth, silky mouthfeel.
Sugar
Sweetens the filling and helps stabilize the egg whites.
Chopped pecans
Add crunchy texture and a toasted nutty flavor against the smooth filling.
Sherry and rum
Provide the main alcoholic aroma and flavor that defines the filling.

The step that matters

Cooking over steam until thick. Egg proteins thicken gently with steady, constant stirring. If the heat is too high or stirring stops, the eggs can curdle or scramble, leaving lumps and a grainy texture instead of a smooth filling.

Swap the pecans

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, sugar, butter, sherry, rum):

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Pecansthe original
  3. Walnutfits about as well
  4. Cocoafits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, butter, sherry, rum. 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.

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