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Dessert

Steamed Fig Pudding

A steamed pudding made with molasses, suet, sweet milk, figs, flour, spices, and baking soda.

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

Steamed Fig Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Mix the molasses, chopped suet, sweet milk, chopped figs, flour, cinnamon, nutmeg, salt, and baking soda dissolved in hot water together in a large bowl.

  2. Pour the mixture into a greased pudding mold.

Steam

  1. Cover the mold and steam for three hours.

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. Fig + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together614 recipes

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

  3. Fig + nutmegtop 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. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Molasses
Adds moisture, dark color, and a deep sweetness to the pudding.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and tender as it steams.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the pudding together.
Baking soda
Reacts with the molasses' acidity to help the pudding rise and lighten.
Figs
Add chewy texture and natural sweetness throughout the pudding.

Swap the fig

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against molasses, milk, 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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