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Dessert

A Good Plain Pudding

A steamed pudding made with butter, molasses, eggs, sour milk, spices, baking soda, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

A Good Plain Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Melt the butter and add the molasses.

  2. Beat in the eggs, sour milk, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

  3. Dissolve the baking soda in boiling water and add to the mixture.

  4. Mix thoroughly and then add the flour.

Steam and serve

  1. Pour into a greased pudding mold, cover, and steam for 3 hours.

  2. Serve hot with your choice of 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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Nutmeg + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Cinnamon + flourtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as the pudding sets.
Baking soda
Reacts with the sour milk and molasses acid to lighten the pudding.
Flour
Provides the main structure that sets the pudding as it steams.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color, and moisture with a deep flavor.
Sour milk
Adds moisture and acidity that activates the baking soda.
Butter
Adds richness and tenderness to the crumb.

The step that matters

Dissolve the baking soda in boiling water and add to the mixture.. Baking soda needs an acid to react and lift the batter. It should be fully dissolved and mixed in promptly so the bubbles form evenly and are trapped before the pudding sets during steaming.

“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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