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Dessert

Stewed Graham Pudding

A steamed pudding made with graham flour, molasses, raisins, sweet milk, egg, salt, and baking powder.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and raisin 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 ↓

Stewed Graham Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, combine graham flour, molasses, raisins, sweet milk, egg, salt, and baking powder, mixing until well combined.

  2. Pour the mixture into a greased steaming dish.

Steam and serve

  1. Steam for 2 hours.

  2. Serve warm with hard 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. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Molasses + raisintop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,577 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Raisin + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,155 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanoic acid (acides aroma).

  5. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Graham flour
Provides the bulk and the coarse, wholesome structure of the pudding.
New orleans molasses
Adds moisture, dark sweetness and a deep flavour to the pudding.
Egg
Binds the batter and helps it set firm as it cooks.
Baking powder
Releases gas as it heats, lifting the batter so the pudding is light.
Sweet milk
Adds moisture and loosens the batter so it can be poured and steamed evenly.

The step that matters

Steam for 2 hours. Steaming must stay gentle and steady for the full time. Steam that drops too low leaves the centre dense and under-set, while letting water boil into the dish can make the pudding soggy.

“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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