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Yorkshire Pudding

A baked batter made from milk, eggs, flour, salt, baking powder, and roast beef drippings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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Yorkshire Pudding

Why it works: Milk and beef are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,759 recipes. Both carry 1-hexanal, which smells fruit. The science ↓

Yorkshire Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsThe hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “the hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

Make and bake the batter

  1. In a bowl, mix milk, beaten egg whites, egg yolks, salt, baking powder, and flour until smooth, resembling the consistency of cream.

  2. Dip drippings into two biscuit tins and pour half of the pudding mixture into each tin.

  3. Place the tins in the hot oven and bake until the roast beef is ready, about 30 to 40 minutes.

Serve

  1. Remove the puddings from the oven just before serving and serve hot.

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.

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.

  1. Milk + beeftop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,759 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  5. Flour + beeftop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together10,677 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, 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
Whites trap air and yolks add richness, helping the puddings rise and set with a tender structure.
Flour
Provides the starch and gluten that set the batter and give the puddings their structure.
Milk
Adds moisture and helps the batter bake into a tender, custardy interior.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the hot oven, helping the puddings rise.
Drippings from roast beef
Hot fat in the tins sears the batter's base, promoting browning and crisp edges.

The step that matters

Preheat the oven and tins until very hot before adding the batter. The batter must hit a very hot fat and oven so steam and gas expand quickly, producing a high rise. A cool oven or tin lets the batter spread and bake flat and dense.

“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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