Why it works: Milk and molasses are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,243 recipes. Both carry furaneol, which smells caramel, strawberry. The science ↓
Boiled Corn Meal Pudding, Without Eggs
Ingredients
Directions
Mix the batter
In a large bowl, stir the Indian meal and salt into the boiling milk.
Add the molasses and chopped suet, mixing well.
Stir in the dissolved baking soda.
Boil and serve
Tie the mixture tightly in a cloth, leaving room for it to swell.
Boil for 4 hours.
Serve with sweet sauce.
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.
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Milk + molassestop 21% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together7,243 recipes
Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Indian meal
- Cornmeal that thickens with the hot milk and gives the pudding its body.
- Boiling milk
- Liquid that softens and swells the meal as it cooks into a soft mass.
- Molasses
- Adds sweetness and dark colour, and its acidity reacts with the baking soda.
- Chopped suet
- Fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich during long boiling.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the molasses acid to release gas that lightens and lifts the pudding.
The step that matters
Tying the cloth. The pudding rises and swells as it cooks, so the cloth must be snug enough to hold its shape but loose enough to leave room. Too tight can burst it or stop it expanding; too loose lets it spread and lose form.
“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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