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Dessert

English Plum Pudding

A steamed pudding made with raisins, currants, suet, flour, eggs, brandy, sweet wine, sugar, spices, and optional milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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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 ↓

English Plum Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Mix

  1. In a large bowl, combine the raisins, currants, suet, flour, eggs, brandy, sweet wine, sugar, and spices.

  2. If the mixture is too dry, add a little sweet milk.

Boil

  1. Tie the mixture tightly in a well-floured cloth that has been dipped in hot water.

  2. Boil the pudding for 4 hours, or use a pudding form to boil.

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. Raisin + flourtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Currant + brandytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Brandy + winetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,427 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  4. Raisin + curranttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,180 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).

  5. Raisin + brandytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,768 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

What each ingredient does

Suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich as it cooks.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the pudding together as it steams.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and help set its structure during cooking.
Raisins
Add concentrated sweetness and chewy texture throughout the pudding.
Currants
Contribute sweetness, fruitiness and chewy texture throughout the pudding.

The step that matters

Tying the cloth. The cloth must be well floured and tightly tied so the pudding keeps its shape and the flour crust forms a barrier. A loose cloth lets water into the pudding during the long boil, making it soggy.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (raisin, flour, egg, brandy, wine, sugar, milk):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Applefits about as well
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against raisin, flour, egg, brandy, wine, sugar, milk. 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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