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Dessert

Indian Pudding

A sweet custard-like dessert made from milk, cornmeal, raisins, molasses, ginger, and sugar, baked until set.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and corn are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,955 recipes. Both carry hexanal, which smells green, grassy. The science ↓

Indian Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the pudding base

  1. In a double boiler, cook the corn meal with salt and milk for 30 minutes.

  2. Add molasses, ginger, sugar, raisins, and beaten egg.

Bake and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into a greased baking dish.

  2. Bake for 2 hours at 300°F (150°C).

  3. Serve with milk or 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. Milk + corntop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  2. Ginger + corntop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together412 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Ginger + raisintop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,242 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Raisin + molassestop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,577 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Corn meal
Thickens the milk as it cooks, giving the pudding its body and soft, spoonable texture.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that the corn meal thickens and the pudding bakes in.
Egg
Helps the pudding set as it bakes, giving it a firmer, custard-like structure.
Molasses
Adds deep sweetness and color, and a rich, caramel-like flavor to the pudding.
Raisins
Add pockets of chewy sweetness and moisture throughout the baked pudding.

The step that matters

Cooking the corn meal in the milk. Corn meal must cook long enough in the hot milk to fully swell and thicken; stirring prevents lumps and scorching, and the starch set determines the final texture.

Swap the ginger

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, corn, sugar, raisin, molasses, egg. 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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