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Dessert

Fig Pudding

A steamed pudding made with figs, bread crumbs, suet, sugar, lemon rind, nutmeg, and egg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,318 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Fig Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Boil the figs and chop them finely.

Make the pudding

  1. In a bowl, combine the chopped figs, bread crumbs, suet, sugar, grated lemon rind, and grated nutmeg.

  2. Add the egg and mix well.

  3. Transfer the mixture to a pudding mold.

Steam

  1. Steam for 3 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. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Fig + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together510 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  3. Fig + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together374 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Fig + lemontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together763 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Bread crumbs
Provide the bulk and soft body that holds the pudding together.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich as it steams.
Egg
Binds the mixture so it sets firmly rather than crumbling.
Figs
Supply chopped fruit sweetness and a soft, jammy texture.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps give the pudding a tender crumb.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Datesfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fig, bread, egg, sugar, 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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