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Dessert

Fig Pudding

A steamed pudding made with molasses, suet, buttermilk, eggs, flour, figs, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Fig Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Mix the molasses, suet, and spices together in a bowl.

  2. Dissolve the baking soda in 1 teaspoon of hot water.

  3. Mix the dissolved baking soda with the other ingredients.

  4. Beat the eggs until light.

  5. Stir the beaten eggs into the mixture.

  6. Add the figs and flour to the mixture.

  7. Beat the mixture thoroughly until it has the consistency of cake.

Steam and serve

  1. Steam the pudding for 2½ hours.

  2. Steam the pudding for an additional 30 minutes.

  3. Serve the pudding with a 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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cinnamon + figtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together614 recipes

    Shared aroma: cinnamyl acetate (sweet aromatic, cinnamon).

  3. Nutmeg + figtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together510 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  4. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Buttermilk + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,721 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Molasses
Adds sweetness, moisture, and a dark, rich flavor.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and tender.
Buttermilk or soured milk
Its acidity reacts with the baking soda to help the pudding rise.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as the pudding sets.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acid in the buttermilk to produce gas that lifts the batter.
Flour
Provides the starch and gluten that give the pudding its structure.

The step that matters

Mix the dissolved baking soda with the other ingredients.. Baking soda only lifts the batter when it meets acid, such as the buttermilk or soured milk. Mixing it in evenly spreads the reaction through the batter, so the pudding rises uniformly rather than in patches.

Swap the fig

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (molasses, buttermilk, egg, flour, cinnamon, nutmeg):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits about as well
  3. Blueberryfits about as well
  4. Figthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against molasses, buttermilk, egg, flour, cinnamon, 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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