Skip to main content
Dessert

Date and Marshmallow Pudding

A gelatin-based pudding with dates, pecans, and marshmallows, topped with whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

Date and Marshmallow Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the gelatine base

  1. Place the gelatine in the cold water, stir, and let stand for 5 to 6 minutes.

  2. Add the boiling water, sugar, and lemon juice to the gelatine mixture. Stir until well mixed and set aside.

Set the pudding

  1. When the mixture begins to thicken, add the dates and nuts.

  2. Pour into molds and let set until firm.

Make the topping and serve

  1. When ready to serve, whip the cream until stiff. Fold in the marshmallows.

  2. Spoon a large dollop of the marshmallow cream over each mold after it is turned out onto a serving dish.

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

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

  3. Sugar + datestop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together985 recipes

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

  4. Lemon + datestop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together213 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Meat + creamtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,248 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

Gelatine
Sets the liquid into a firm, sliceable structure as it cools.
Whipping cream
Whipped to stiffness, it adds airy richness to the topping.
Marshmallows
Melt slightly into the cream, giving the topping sweetness and a soft, light body.
Dates
Add natural sweetness and chewy texture to the set pudding.
Sugar
Sweetens the pudding and helps balance the lemon juice.

The step that matters

Adding the dates and nuts at the thickening stage. If the gelatine is still too liquid, the dates and nuts will sink to the bottom; if it has set too far, they will not distribute evenly. Adding them as the mixture begins to thicken suspends them throughout the pudding.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, dates, meat, cream):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, dates, meat, cream. 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.

You might also like

Lemon CakeLemon Cake228 recipesLemon IceLemon Ice147 recipesLemon SherbetLemon Sherbet103 recipesLemon CustardLemon Custard64 recipes