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Dessert

Indian Pudding

A sweet cornmeal pudding baked with milk, molasses, butter, cinnamon, ginger, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and ginger match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,380 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Indian Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the pudding

  1. Stir the Indian meal into the scalding milk.

  2. Add the molasses, butter, cinnamon, and ginger.

  3. Pour in the cold water as you place the pudding in the oven.

Bake

  1. Bake for 45 minutes at 400°F (200°C).

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. Cinnamon + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Molasses + cinnamontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,928 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Molasses + gingertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Indian meal
Cornmeal thickens the warm milk and gives the pudding its body and grainy texture.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, deep color, and a rich caramel-like flavor during baking.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smoother, softer mouthfeel.
Scalding milk
Hydrates the cornmeal and begins thickening the pudding before baking.

The step that matters

Pouring in the cold water as the pudding goes into the oven. Cold water added at this point loosens the thick cornmeal mixture so it bakes moist rather than stiff. Adding it at the wrong moment, or stirring it in too early, can change the final texture.

Swap the ginger

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, molasses, butter, egg, cinnamon):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, molasses, butter, egg, cinnamon. 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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