Skip to main content
Dessert

Thanksgiving Pudding

A steamed pudding made with butter, molasses, milk, eggs, raisins, currants, citron, and flour.

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

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 ↓

Thanksgiving Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, cream the butter and molasses together.

  2. Add the milk and baking soda, mixing well.

  3. Beat in the eggs one at a time.

  4. Stir in the raisins, currants, citron, and salt.

  5. Gradually add flour until the mixture is as stiff as pound cake.

Steam and serve

  1. Pour the batter into a greased mold.

  2. Steam for 6 hours.

  3. Serve with sauce.

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

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

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

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

  4. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Molasses + raisintop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,577 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Adds fat and richness, giving the pudding a tender crumb.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color and moisture to the batter.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as the pudding sets.
Baking soda
Reacts with the molasses' acidity to lighten the batter.
Raisins
Add chewy sweetness and moisture throughout the pudding.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the pudding together.

The step that matters

Gradually add flour until the mixture is as stiff as pound cake. Too much flour makes the pudding dense and dry, while too little leaves it loose and unable to hold its shape during steaming. Adding flour gradually lets you judge the consistency.

Swap the currant

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

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

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

You might also like

Molasses CookiesMolasses Cookies96 recipesMolasses CakeMolasses Cake90 recipesRed Currant JellyRed Currant Jelly65 recipesCurrant Ice CreamCurrant Ice Cream32 recipes