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Dessert

Jam Pudding

A steamed cake made from flour, butter, water, and jam, served with cream, sugar, or lemon sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Jam Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dough

  1. Mix flour and baking powder in a bowl.

  2. Add butter and mix until well combined.

  3. Gradually add cold water to form a dough.

  4. Roll the dough into a sheet.

Fill and roll

  1. Spread jam or jelly over the sheet.

  2. Roll the dough like a jelly cake.

  3. Pinch the ends and seam together.

Steam and serve

  1. Place in a well-buttered steamer and steam for 1 hour.

  2. Serve with cream and sugar or lemon sauce.

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. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

All-purpose flour
Forms the structure of the dough that holds the roll together.
Baking powder
Releases gas during steaming so the dough rises and turns light.
Butter
Adds fat that tenderises the dough and helps it stay moist.
Jam or jelly
Adds sweetness and moisture that soaks slightly into the dough as it steams.

The step that matters

Pinch the ends and seam together.. A tight seal keeps the jam from leaking out during steaming, so the filling stays inside the roll and the dough cooks evenly.

“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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