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Dessert

Raisin Puffs

A steamed pastry made with milk, butter, flour, raisins, baking powder, sugar, and eggs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and raisin 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 ↓

Raisin Puffs

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, combine milk, butter, flour, raisins, baking powder, sugar, and eggs.

  2. Mix until well combined.

  3. Pour the mixture into cups and steam for one hour.

Serve

  1. Serve with sugar and cream or a sauce made of 2 cups sugar, 1 cup butter, and 2 eggs mixed together.

  2. When ready to serve, pour over 1 cup of boiling water.

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. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Raisin + sugartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,481 recipes

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

  5. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Flour
Forms the structure of the puffs as the batter sets during steaming.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure and richness to the puffs.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter, helping the puffs rise and turn light.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and richness in the crumb.
Milk
Hydrates the flour and gives the batter its moisture.

The step that matters

Pour the mixture into cups and steam for one hour. Steam must be kept steadily flowing around the cups for the full hour. Uneven or weak steam lets the batter set unevenly, so the puffs may stay dense or collapse.

Swap the raisin

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

  1. Vanillafits about as well
  2. Raisinthe original
  3. Figfits less well
  4. Coconutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, butter, flour, sugar, egg. 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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