Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
Munsey Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Grease a tin pan with butter.
Line the pan with the crumbled bread.
Assemble and bake
Layer the apples, bread, and suet alternately in the pan.
Sprinkle sugar and nutmeg between the layers.
Bake until golden brown and cooked through.
Serve
Serve warm with wine sauce.
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.
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Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Apple + nutmegtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,790 recipes
Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
-
Bread + appletop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,790 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Bread + nutmegtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,997 recipes
Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
-
Apple + buttertop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,706 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Bread
- Forms the base structure of the pudding and soaks up the fat and juices as it bakes.
- Suet
- Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich as it cooks.
- Pippin apples
- Provide tartness and moisture that contrast with the sweetness and soften during baking.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the top and edges brown as the pudding bakes.
Swap the nutmeg
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, apple, sugar, butter):
- Cinnamonfits better
- Nutmegthe original
- Clovefits about as well
- Gingerfits less well
Fit is the average pairing score against bread, apple, sugar, butter. 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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