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Dessert

Fig Pudding

A steamed pudding made with bread crumbs, milk, eggs, suet, sugar, and figs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and fig are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,026 recipes. Both carry methyl 2-methylbutyrate, which smells fruity, apple. The science ↓

Fig Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Soak the bread crumbs in the milk.

  2. Add a pinch of baking soda.

  3. Chop the figs and beat the eggs until light.

  4. Chop the suet and mix it with the sugar and milk.

  5. Combine all ingredients well.

Steam and serve

  1. Grease a mold and pour in the pudding mixture.

  2. Steam for 2.5 hours.

  3. Serve with your preferred sauce.

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. Milk + figtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,026 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  2. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  3. Bread + figtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together374 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  5. Sugar + figtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,241 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Bread crumbs
Soaked in milk, they form the soft, absorbent body of the pudding.
Eggs
Beaten eggs bind the mixture and help it set as it cooks.
Suet
Adds richness and fat, giving the pudding a moist, tender texture.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the rich suet and figs.
Figs
Chopped figs add sweetness, fruit flavor and chewy pieces throughout the pudding.

The step that matters

Steaming for the full time. Steaming gently and for the full time lets the egg and crumb mixture set evenly through the middle. Cutting the time short can leave the center wet and loose.

Swap the fig

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figthe original
  3. Datesfits less well
  4. Raisinfits less well

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

More fig pudding recipes

Steamed 14Sauce 7English 3 See all 340 →

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