Skip to main content
Main

Snipes, Pudding of

A steamed pudding made with snipes, rump steak, cayenne pepper, sea salt, beef gravy, and a pastry crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Pepper and beef are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,971 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Snipes, Pudding of

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the snipes

  1. Pluck and singe the snipes, then cut them in half.

  2. Remove the gizzards with a knife, leaving the tails intact.

  3. Season the snipes with coarse sea salt and cayenne pepper.

Assemble the pudding

  1. Line a pudding basin with the pudding crust.

  2. Place a slice of rump steak in the basin, seasoned with salt and pepper.

  3. Add the snipes on top of the steak, then place another slice of steak over them.

  4. Pour ½ cup of beef gravy over the meat.

  5. Cover with pastry, pressing the edges together to seal.

Cook and serve

  1. Steam or boil the pudding for 2.5 hours.

  2. Carefully turn it out and serve hot.

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. Pepper + beeftop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Snipes
Form the main meat filling and provide the dish's central flavour.
Rump steak
Adds meaty bulk and tenderness to the filling as it cooks slowly.
Beef gravy
Adds moisture and savoury depth so the filling does not dry out during cooking.
Pudding crust
Lines and encloses the filling, holding its juices and shape while it steams.

The step that matters

Sealing the pastry edges. A tight seal keeps steam and juices inside the pudding during the long cook. Gaps let water seep in and let the filling dry or go watery.

“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.

You might also like

Roast BeefRoast Beef211 recipesBeef LoafBeef Loaf175 recipesCorned BeefCorned Beef87 recipesBeef BrothBeef Broth67 recipes