Skip to main content
Dessert

English Plum Pudding

A traditional English plum pudding made with suet, sugar, eggs, raisins, currants, flour, bread crumbs, milk, brandy, wine, nutmeg, ginger, salt, and cinnamon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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

Prepare

  1. Chop the suet finely.

  2. In a large bowl, combine the suet, sugar, eggs, raisins, currants, flour, bread crumbs, milk, brandy, wine, nutmegs, ginger, salt, and cinnamon. Mix well until all ingredients are combined.

Cook

  1. Tie the mixture in a cloth bag securely.

  2. Boil the bag in water for 6 hours.

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. Currant + brandytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Raisin + curranttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,180 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).

  4. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich as it cooks.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and help give the pudding its set structure.
Flour
Provides starch that gives the pudding body and structure.
Bread crumbs
Soak up liquids and add softness to the dense mixture.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps balance the spices and dried fruit.
Currants
Contribute concentrated fruit sweetness and chewy texture throughout the pudding.

The step that matters

Securing the cloth bag. If the bag is not tied tightly, water can seep into the pudding during boiling, making it soggy and diluting its flavor. A well-sealed bag also keeps the mixture compact so it cooks evenly.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Datesfits about as well
  4. Currantthe original

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

You might also like

Soft Ginger BreadSoft Ginger Bread85 recipesGingerbreadGingerbread25 recipesGinger CookiesGinger Cookies213 recipesBread PuddingBread Pudding153 recipes