Skip to main content
Dessert

Maryland Christmas Pudding

A steamed pudding made with stale bread, raisins, currants, citron, suet, sugar, eggs, milk, brandy, sherry, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

Maryland Christmas Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. In a large bowl, mix the grated bread, raisins, currants, citron, suet, sugar, and spices.

  2. In a separate bowl, beat the egg yolks and then add the milk.

Mix and steam

  1. Combine the milk mixture with the dry ingredients and mix thoroughly.

  2. Fold in the beaten egg whites gently until well incorporated.

  3. Pour the mixture into a greased pudding mold and steam for several 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. Raisin + flourtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Currant + brandytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Raisin + curranttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,180 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).

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

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  5. Raisin + brandytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,768 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

Eggs
Yolks enrich and bind the batter, while separately beaten whites add lightness to the pudding.
Grated stale bread
Absorbs the milk and forms the body of the pudding.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich as it steams.
Raisins
Provide chewy texture and concentrated sweetness.
Sugar
Sweetens the pudding and adds to its moist, tender crumb.
Milk
Moistens the dry ingredients so the bread softens and the batter holds together.

The step that matters

Folding in the beaten egg whites. Whites hold air only if they are beaten well and folded in gently. Stirring vigorously would deflate them, leaving a denser pudding.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Datesfits about as well
  4. Currantthe original

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

You might also like

Bread PuddingBread Pudding153 recipesSoft Ginger BreadSoft Ginger Bread85 recipesOrange Potato BreadOrange Potato Bread80 recipesBrandy PeachesBrandy Peaches68 recipes