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Dessert

Plum Pudding

A steamed or boiled pudding made from eggs, sugar, coffee, suet, dried fruit, candied peel, spices, bread crumbs, flour, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
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Why it works: Orange and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Plum Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Mix the pudding

  1. In a large bowl, combine the eggs and brown sugar until well mixed.

  2. Stir in the cold coffee and beef suet.

  3. Add the raisins, currants, citron, candied orange peel, and candied lemon peel.

  4. Mix in the spices, bread crumbs, flour, and salt until fully combined.

Cook

  1. Transfer the mixture into a cloth bag and secure it tightly.

  2. Boil the bag in water for 4 hours or steam it for 6 hours.

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. Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  2. Raisin + curranttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,180 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).

  3. Coffee + beeftop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together213 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methyl-3-(methyldithio)furan (thiamin, meat).

  4. Raisin + orangetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,684 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Coffee + orangetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together326 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (buttery, creamy).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the mixture and add structure and richness as the pudding sets.
Beef suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich during long cooking.
Flour
Provides the starch that gives the pudding its body and firm texture.
Bread crumbs
Soak up liquid and help give the pudding a tender, binding crumb.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and a molasses note that deepens the color and flavor.
Raisins
Add concentrated sweetness and chewy moisture throughout the pudding.

The step that matters

Securing the cloth bag. If the bag is not tied tightly, water can seep into the pudding during boiling and make it soggy and diluted. A snug seal keeps the mixture dense and moist while it cooks for hours in the water or steam.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, sugar, coffee, beef, raisin, orange, lemon):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Cranberryfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, coffee, beef, raisin, orange, lemon. 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 plum pudding recipes

English 165Christmas 156Sauce 71Eggless 34Baked 33Vegetable 19 See all 649 →

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