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Dessert

Baked Indian Pudding

A baked pudding made with yellow meal, molasses, milk, butter, egg, and spices, cooked for three hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Mary Ronald · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 12 ingredients
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Baked Indian Pudding

Why it works: Nutmeg and ginger match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,324 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Baked Indian Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the meal

  1. Put two cupfuls of milk, a quarter cupful of water, and the salt on the fire; when it boils, stir in the meal, and let it cook five minutes, stirring all the time.

Bake and serve

  1. Remove from the fire, add the rest of the milk mixed with the molasses, the butter, the beaten egg, and the nutmeg (or ginger, if preferred), and turn it into a baking-dish.

  2. Sprinkle small bits of candied orange-peel on the bottom of the dish before the batter is put in.

  3. Bake it in a slow oven for three hours.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

401Calories
14 gProtein
26 gFat
29 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
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Molasses1 tbsp (20g)58
Nutmeg1 tsp ground (2.2g)12
Ginger1 tsp grated fresh (2g)2
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Waternot in our table0

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

By Mary Ronald. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Nutmeg + gingertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,324 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Molasses + gingertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Milk + nutmegtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,685 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Butter + nutmegtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together24,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Yellow meal
Thickens the pudding as its starch swells in the hot milk, giving it body.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color, and a rich, caramel-like flavor.
Egg
Sets during baking, giving the pudding a firmer, custard-like structure.
Milk
Provides the main liquid, keeping the pudding moist and creamy as it bakes.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smoother, more tender texture.

The step that matters

Stirring the meal into boiling milk. Cornmeal clumps if it hits hot liquid unstirred. Constant stirring disperses the grains so the starch swells evenly and thickens the mixture smoothly.

Swap the ginger

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (molasses, butter, milk, egg, nutmeg):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Clovefits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. Gingerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against molasses, butter, milk, egg, nutmeg. 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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