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Dessert

Plain Plum Pudding

A steamed pudding made with stale bread, milk, sugar, raisins, currants, molasses, and citron.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Gibson, Marietta Fauntleroy Hollyday, "Mrs. C. H. Gibson." · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 92,116 recipes. Both carry phenylacetaldehyde, which smells hawthorne, honey. The science ↓

Plain Plum Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Soak the bread

  1. Break stale loaf of baker's bread into small pieces.

  2. Let the pieces soak in milk until they have absorbed all it will.

  3. Drain the mixture thoroughly and work out all the milk you can with a spoon.

Mix and boil

  1. If you have any beef suet, add a little, but it will do without.

  2. Stir in half a teacupful of molasses, half pound brown sugar, half pound stoned raisins, quarter pound of currants rolled in flour, and a few pieces of citron.

  3. Boil the mixture in either a mold or a pudding bag.

Serve

  1. Eat with wine sauce.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

566Calories
14 gProtein
2 gFat
124 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 3 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Grape1/2 cup (76g)62
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Gibson, Marietta Fauntleroy Hollyday, "Mrs. C. H. Gibson.". 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. See the original page.

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. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  2. Currant + flourtop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,077 recipes
  3. Sugar + curranttop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,256 recipes

Sugar and currant barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,256 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

Baker's bread (in the method)
Soaked in milk, it absorbs liquid and gives the pudding its body.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and a deeper, caramel-like flavour to the pudding.
Raisins (in the method)
Add sweetness and soft, chewy pockets of fruit throughout the pudding.
Currants
Add small, chewy bits of fruit and extra sweetness throughout the pudding.

The step that matters

Drain the mixture thoroughly and work out all the milk you can with a spoon.. Leftover milk makes the bread mixture wet, so the pudding can turn heavy and soggy instead of holding a firm, moist crumb when boiled.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Blueberryfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, flour. 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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