Why it works: Dates and orange work together. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 151 recipes. Both carry 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol, which smells clove, smoky. The science ↓
Old English Plum Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Pour the milk over the bread crumbs and mix well.
Add the brown sugar, salt, and chopped suet to the mixture.
Stir in the raisins, dates, nut meats, citron, and orange peel.
Beat the egg yolks and add them to the softened mixture.
Combine all ingredients thoroughly.
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.
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Dates + orangetop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together151 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol (clove, smoky).
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Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together11,466 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
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Bread + datestop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together100 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
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Raisin + datestop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together358 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Raisin + orangetop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,684 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
Swap the orange
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, bread, sugar, raisin, dates, meat, egg):
- Figfits better
- Vanillafits better
- Coconutfits better
- Orangethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against milk, bread, sugar, raisin, dates, meat, egg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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