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Dessert

Plum Pudding

A steamed Christmas-style pudding of suet, dried fruit, bread crumbs, eggs, and brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Raisin and almond are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,781 recipes. Both carry 2-nonanone, which smells fruity, floral. The science ↓

Plum Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Prepare the fruit the day before and soak it in brandy overnight.

  2. In a deep bowl, mix the suet, raisins, currants, citron, sugar, bread crumbs, diced apples, almonds, lemon peel, salt, cloves, cinnamon, beaten eggs, and brandy.

Steam

  1. Butter a pudding mold and fill it with the mixture.

  2. Cover the mold tightly.

  3. Place the mold in a deep kettle with a plate at the bottom.

  4. Fill the kettle with boiling water to almost the top of the mold.

  5. Boil for 3 hours steadily.

Serve

  1. Turn the pudding out onto a hot dish.

  2. Sprinkle with sugar and pour a small cup of brandy over it.

  3. Light the brandy and serve immediately.

  4. Serve hot with Roman sauce or reheat by steaming over boiling water.

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 + almondtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,781 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  2. Apple + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,774 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Raisin + clovetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,070 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  4. Lemon + clovetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,150 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Almond + lemontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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 help set the pudding as it steams.
Bread crumbs
Absorb liquid and give the pudding a soft, tender body.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich as it cooks.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps balance the spices and dried fruit.
Raisins
Contribute sweetness, chewy texture and moisture from the dried fruit.

The step that matters

Boil for 3 hours steadily. The water must stay at a steady boil and the kettle should not run dry. Gentle, continuous steaming cooks the eggs and crumbs through evenly without leaving the pudding soggy or undercooked.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (raisin, sugar, bread, apple, almond, lemon, clove):

  1. Figfits better
  2. Orangefits better
  3. Vanillafits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against raisin, sugar, bread, apple, almond, lemon, clove. 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 plum pudding recipes

English 165Christmas 156Sauce 71Eggless 34Baked 33Vegetable 19 See all 649 →

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