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Dessert

A Sweetmeat Pudding

A sweetmeat pudding made from puff pastry and marmalade, boiled and finished with a butter-sugar-wine glaze.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

A Sweetmeat Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pastry

  1. Make a quart of flour into puff pastry.

  2. Divide the pastry into three parts of unequal size.

  3. Roll the largest part into a square, about ¼ inch thick.

Layer and roll

  1. Spread a thin layer of marmalade over the largest piece, leaving a 1‑inch margin.

  2. Roll the next largest piece in the same manner and place it on top, covering it with marmalade and leaving a margin.

  3. Roll the smallest piece and place it on top of the other two, spreading marmalade on it as well.

  4. Fold the pastry up, one fold over the other, about the width of your hand.

  5. Press the ends together and tie it securely in a cloth.

Boil and serve

  1. Place it in a kettle of boiling water, ensuring it lies flat without doubling.

  2. Boil quickly, and when done, pour melted butter mixed with sugar and wine over it.

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 + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Butter + winetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,645 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  3. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Flour + winetop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,435 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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

All-purpose flour
Forms the pastry dough that wraps and holds the layers together.
Marmalade
Adds sweetness and a fruity acidity between the pastry layers.
Melted butter
Adds richness and moisture to the finished pudding.
Sugar
Adds sweetness to the butter and wine sauce poured over the pudding.
Wine
Adds acidity and aroma to the butter and sugar sauce.

The step that matters

Boil quickly, and when done, pour melted butter mixed with sugar and wine over it.. The pastry must stay submerged and boil vigorously so it cooks through and sets. Pouring the sauce over the hot pudding lets it soak in while the pastry is still warm.

“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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