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Dessert

Fruit Pudding

A steamed pudding made with molasses, sweet milk, butter, raisins, flour, baking soda, cream of tartar, salt, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Fruit Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, mix together molasses, sweet milk, and butter until well combined.

  2. Add the seeded raisins, flour, baking soda, cream of tartar, salt, and spices. Mix until smooth.

Steam and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into a greased pudding mold.

  2. Steam for 4 to 5 hours.

  3. Serve with a rich 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. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

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

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

  5. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Provides the structure that holds the pudding together as it steams.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color and moisture to the batter.
Butter
Adds fat for a tender, rich crumb.
Baking soda
Reacts with the cream of tartar and molasses to lift the batter as it cooks.
Cream of tartar
Acts with the baking soda to create gas bubbles for rising and adds mild acidity.
Raisins
Add chewy texture and concentrated sweetness throughout the pudding.

The step that matters

Steaming for 4 to 5 hours. Steam must stay steady and the water must not run dry, because uneven or low heat stalls the leavening and makes the pudding dense or soggy. Keep the mold sealed so moisture stays in.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (molasses, milk, butter, raisin, flour, cream, cinnamon):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cardamomfits about as well
  3. Clovethe original
  4. Allspicefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against molasses, milk, butter, raisin, flour, cream, cinnamon. 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 fruit pudding recipes

Steamed 91Boiled 17Cold 14English 14Baked 12Tapioca 11 See all 210 →

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