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Dessert

French Plum Pudding

A steamed pudding made with beef kidney grease, raisins, bread crumbs, and spices, served with rum and brandy sauces.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Raisin and flour 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 ↓

French Plum Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the raisins in lukewarm water and place them in a bowl with the chopped peel, steeping in a little brandy.

  2. Melt the beef kidney fat and chop it very fine with a spoonful of flour.

  3. Mix the fat with the bread crumbs, powdered sugar, and eggs.

  4. Add the raisins, peel, remaining brandy, salt, nutmeg, ginger, and finally the cream, mixing well.

Shape and boil

  1. Spread the mixture in a large, well-buttered cloth.

  2. Fold the corners of the cloth.

  3. Tie the cloth to shape the pudding.

  4. Plunge the pudding into a saucepan of boiling water.

  5. Boil constantly for 4 hours.

Finish and serve

  1. Remove the pudding and let it drain in a sieve.

  2. Cut the top to keep it level.

  3. Turn the pudding out onto a dish.

  4. Carefully remove the cloth.

  5. Sprinkle with a little rum sauce.

  6. Serve with brandy sauce on the side.

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. Raisin + flourtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Orange + gingertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,833 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  3. Nutmeg + gingertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,324 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Raisin + nutmegtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-terpineol (lilac, floral).

  5. Orange + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,746 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef kidney fat
Adds richness and moisture, keeping the pudding tender as it cooks.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and help it set firm during boiling.
Fresh bread crumbs
Give body to the pudding and soak up moisture and fat.
Raisins
Provide sweetness and chewy texture throughout the pudding.
Powdered sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the pudding brown lightly.
Brandy
Adds aroma and flavour that carries through the pudding.

The step that matters

Boil constantly for 4 hours. The pudding must stay submerged in continuously boiling water so heat reaches the centre and the eggs and fat set evenly. If the water drops off the boil, the pudding cooks unevenly and can turn heavy or soggy.

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, raisin, bread, flour, sugar, nutmeg, ginger):

  1. Figfits better
  2. Lemonfits about as well
  3. Coconutfits about as well
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, raisin, bread, flour, sugar, nutmeg, ginger. 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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