Why it works: Egg and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 122,807 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Prune Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare the prunes
Stew the prunes in enough water to cover them until soft.
Remove the stones and chop the prunes finely.
Make the pudding
In a bowl, beat the egg whites to stiff peaks and gently fold in the sugar and salt.
Add the chopped prunes to the egg mixture and combine well.
Pour the mixture into a baking dish and bake at 350°F (175°C) for 20 minutes.
Top and brown
Top with a meringue made from the remaining egg whites and lightly brown it.
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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Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Prunes
- Provide moisture, sweetness and a soft, dense body to the pudding.
- Egg whites
- Whipped into a foam that sets when baked, giving the pudding its light structure.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps stabilize the whipped egg white foam.
The step that matters
Gently folding the sugar and salt into the beaten egg whites. Stiff egg white foam holds air that gives lightness. Overmixing or heavy stirring deflates the foam, so the pudding bakes up dense rather than airy.
“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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