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Dessert

Fig Pudding

A steamed pudding made with figs, suet, bread crumbs, sugar, eggs, baking powder, milk, and nutmeg or cinnamon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Fig and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 510 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓

Fig Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Combine figs, suet, bread crumbs, sugar, eggs, baking powder, and milk in a bowl, then mix until well combined.

  2. Pour the mixture into a greased pudding mold.

  3. Steam for three 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. Fig + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together510 recipes

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

  2. Fig + milktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,026 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  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

Figs
Provide the main fruit flavor and moist, sweet body to the pudding.
Suet
Adds richness and fat that keeps the pudding moist and tender while steaming.
Bread crumbs
Give bulk and soft structure that helps hold the pudding together.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and help set it into a firm, cohesive pudding.
Baking powder
Releases gas that lightens the pudding and gives it a softer rise.

The step that matters

Steam for three hours. Steaming gently and steadily cooks the eggs and starches through without drying the pudding. Letting the water boil dry or lowering the heat too far can leave the pudding dense or undercooked in the centre.

Swap the nutmeg

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Clovefits less well
  4. Allspicefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against fig, bread, sugar, egg, milk. 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 fig pudding recipes

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