Name: Steamed Graham Pudding
Ingredients: one cup sweet milk; one cup raisins; one cup sugar; one cup water; one tablespoon butter; one tablespoon vinegar; one tablespoon flour; half teaspoon lemon; one tea- spoon soda

Why it works: Raisin and flour match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Steamed Graham Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Half a cup molasses, half a cup sugar, one cup sweet milk, one tea- spoon soda, one cup raisins. Stir stiff with flour and steam two hours.
Sauce. — One cup sugar, one cup water, one tablespoon butter, one tablespoon vinegar, one tablespoon flour, half teaspoon lemon or a little wine is nice.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

832Calories

22 gProtein

21 gFat

140 gCarbs

Counts 7 of 8 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 7 portions

Ingredient	Portion assumed	kcal
Flour	1 cup (125g) all-purpose	455
Milk	1 cup (244ml) whole	149
Butter	1 tbsp (14g)	102
Grape	1/2 cup (76g)	62
Sugar	1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated	49
Lemon	juice of 1 lemon (48ml)	12
Vinegar	1 tbsp (15ml) distilled	3
Water	not in our table	0

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

By Towanda, Pa. Christ church. Young ladies society. [from old catalog]. 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.

Raisin + flourtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together9,075 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Lemon + teatop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together610 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Milk + teatop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together738 recipes

Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).
Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour 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

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, raisin, sugar, butter, vinegar, flour, tea):

Vanillafits better
Figfits better
Peachfits about as well
Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, raisin, sugar, butter, vinegar, flour, tea. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.