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Herb Pudding

Herb pudding is a boiled mixture of greens, groats, onions, and lard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and sage match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,445 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Herb Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the spinach, beets, parsley, and leeks.

  2. Scald the greens in boiling water, then shred them very fine.

  3. Soak the groats in warm water for half an hour.

  4. Chop the onions small and hack the sage leaves fine.

Cook

  1. Mix all ingredients together with a little coarse sea salt.

  2. Tie the mixture tightly in a cloth and boil it to soften the pudding.

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. Parsley + sagetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,445 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Spinach + leektop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together42 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Leek + oniontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,326 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl butyrate (apple, fruity).

  4. Parsley + leektop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together759 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  5. Spinach + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,025 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

What each ingredient does

Groats
Form the bulk of the pudding and give it a firm, starchy body.
Hog's lard
Adds fat for richness and a softer, moister texture.
Spinach
Adds leafy bulk, colour and a mild, earthy flavour.
Onions
Contribute savoury sweetness and aroma as they soften.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (spinach, parsley, leek, sage):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Turnipfits better
  3. Parsnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against spinach, parsley, leek, sage. 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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