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Dessert

Caramel Pudding

A caramel-flavored custard made with sugar, cream, lemon rind, egg yolks, and rye whisky, set by steaming.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Caramel Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the caramel

  1. Melt the sugar in a saucepan until it turns light brown.

  2. Pour the melted sugar into a mold, turning it to coat the sides, and let it cool.

Make the custard

  1. In a double boiler, combine the cream and lemon rind, sweetening to taste, and heat until boiling.

  2. Remove from heat and let cool slightly.

  3. Stir in the beaten egg yolks and rye whisky until well combined.

  4. Strain the mixture into the prepared mold.

Steam and serve

  1. Cover the mold with kitchen paper and steam for 45 minutes.

  2. Serve with whipped cream.

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. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  2. Rye + whiskytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together129 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  3. Lemon + ryetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together119 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  4. Cream + whiskytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together258 recipes

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

  5. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Egg yolks
Set the custard into a firm, creamy texture as they cook gently with the cream.
Cream
Adds richness and moisture, giving the pudding a smooth, soft texture.
Granulated sugar
Melts into caramel that coats the mold, and also sweetens the custard.
Rye whisky
Adds aroma and flavour to the custard.

The step that matters

Steam the pudding gently. Egg custard sets through gentle heat; high heat or boiling makes the eggs curdle and the texture grainy or spongy.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, cream, egg, rye, whisky):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cream, egg, rye, whisky. 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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