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Dessert

English Plum Pudding

A steamed pudding made with raisins, currants, suet, flour, breadcrumbs, nutmeg, salt, mixed peel, brown sugar, eggs, and brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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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 ↓

English Plum Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Mix the pudding

  1. In a large bowl, mix together the raisins, currants, suet, flour, bread crumbs, nutmeg, salt, mixed peel, and brown sugar.

  2. Add the beaten eggs and brandy, mixing thoroughly.

Steam

  1. Transfer the mixture to a pudding mold and cover it.

  2. Steam the pudding for 5 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. Raisin + nutmegtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-terpineol (lilac, floral).

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  4. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the mixture and add structure as the pudding sets.
Suet
Adds richness and fat that keeps the pudding moist while steaming.
Flour
Provides structure so the pudding holds its shape.
Bread crumbs
Soak up moisture and lighten the pudding's texture.
Raisins
Add sweetness and chewy moisture throughout the pudding.

Swap the currant

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

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

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

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