Skip to main content
Dessert

Ginger Pudding

A steamed pudding made with flour, suet, molasses, sugar, baking soda, ginger, milk, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Molasses and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,225 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Ginger Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

  1. Mix flour, suet, molasses, sugar, baking soda, ginger, milk, and salt together until well combined.

  2. Grease a pudding mold and pour the mixture into it.

Steam

  1. Steam the pudding for 4 hours (or 45 minutes for individual molds).

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. Molasses + sugartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Molasses + gingertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Flour + gingertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,564 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and milk 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

Flour
Forms the main structure of the pudding as its proteins set during steaming.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and gives it a rich, tender texture.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, depth of flavor, and moisture to the pudding.
Baking soda
Reacts with the molasses's acidity to help the pudding rise and lighten.
Ground ginger
Provides the warm, spicy aroma that defines this pudding.

The step that matters

Steam the pudding for the full time. Steaming gently and steadily cooks the batter through and sets its structure. Cutting the time short leaves the center wet and dense, while uneven steam or a lid that lets water in can make the texture soggy.

Swap the ginger

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, molasses, sugar, milk):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits about as well
  3. Jalapenofits about as well
  4. Gingerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, molasses, sugar, milk. 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.

More ginger pudding recipes

Steamed 11Preserved 6Plain 3 See all 105 →

You might also like

Ginger CookiesGinger Cookies213 recipesMolasses CookiesMolasses Cookies96 recipesGinger CakeGinger Cake93 recipesMolasses CakeMolasses Cake90 recipes