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Dessert

English Plum Pudding

A steamed pudding made with bread, suet, raisins, brown sugar, brandy, ginger, flour, salt, and eggs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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

Make the pudding

  1. Combine the bread, suet, raisins, brown sugar, brandy, ginger, flour, salt, and eggs in a large bowl, then mix well until all ingredients are combined.

  2. Transfer the mixture to a pudding cloth or mold, leaving some room for expansion.

Cook and store

  1. Boil for 5 to 6 hours in a large pot of water.

  2. Store in a cool, dry place for winter use.

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 + gingertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,242 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Raisin + brandytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,768 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Raisin + sugartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  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

Eggs
Bind the mixture and add structure as the pudding sets during boiling.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding rich and moist during long cooking.
Bread
Provides the body of the pudding and soaks up the brandy and moisture.
Raisins
Add concentrated sweetness and chewy texture throughout the pudding.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and a molasses-like depth of flavour.

The step that matters

Leave room in the cloth or mold. The mixture expands as it heats and absorbs liquid, so packing it tightly can cause it to burst or cook unevenly. Leaving space lets it swell safely during the long boil.

Swap the ginger

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Clovefits about as well
  4. Gingerthe original

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