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Dessert

English Plum Pudding

A steamed plum pudding made with suet, candied citrus, dried fruit, spices, sugar, flour, milk, eggs, and lemon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 19 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 ↓

English Plum Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fruit and suet

  1. Run the suet, candied citron, lemon peel, and orange peel through a food chopper.

  2. In a large bowl, combine the chopped mixture with currants, chopped seeded raisins, Sultana raisins, chopped walnuts or almonds, dry bread crumbs, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, brown sugar, and granulated sugar. Mix well.

  3. Let sit in a cool place for several days for better flavor.

Add the wet ingredients and steam

  1. When ready to cook, add flour, milk, beaten eggs, lemon juice, and grated lemon rind to the mixture. Mix thoroughly.

  2. Steam for about 4 hours, keeping the cover on for the first 2½ 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. Lemon + orangetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  4. Orange + cinnamontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,437 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Walnut + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,230 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Suet
Adds richness and moistness, and melts during steaming to keep the pudding tender.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and help it set firm as it cooks.
Flour
Gives the pudding body and structure so it holds its shape.
Dry bread crumbs
Absorb liquid and help give the pudding its crumbly, moist texture.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness along with a deeper, molasses-like flavor.

The step that matters

Keeping the cover on during steaming. Keeping the lid on for the first 2½ hours traps steam so the pudding cooks evenly and stays moist. Lifting it early lets steam escape and can dry the surface and slow cooking.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lemon, orange, raisin, walnut, bread, cinnamon, nutmeg):

  1. Cranberryfits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Limefits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lemon, orange, raisin, walnut, bread, 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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