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Prune Pudding

A gelatin set pudding made from stewed prunes, sugar, gelatin, and brandy, served with whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Prune Pudding

Why it works: Gelatin and cream match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,628 recipes. Both carry acetic acid, which smells sour, vinegar. The science ↓

Prune Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the prune base

  1. Stew the prunes in water until nearly soft.

  2. Add the sugar and continue cooking until done.

  3. Remove the stones and cut each prune into four pieces.

Set and serve

  1. Dissolve the gelatin in boiling water on the stove.

  2. Strain the gelatin into the prunes and mix well.

  3. Add the brandy and pour the mixture into a mold.

  4. Set the mold on ice to chill until firm.

  5. Serve with whipped cream on top.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Gelatin + creamtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,628 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  2. Sugar + gelatintop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,778 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  4. Brandy + creamtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,635 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

  5. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Prunes
Provide the main flavor and body of the pudding, along with natural sweetness.
Gelatin
Sets the liquid prune mixture so it holds its shape when chilled in a mold.
Sugar
Sweetens the prunes and adds body to the stewed fruit.
Brandy
Adds aroma and a warm, boozy flavor to the pudding.

The step that matters

Dissolve the gelatin fully in boiling water. Gelatin must dissolve completely before it is strained into the prunes, otherwise undissolved granules will leave the pudding grainy and it will not set evenly when chilled.

Swap the lemon

The recipe marks lemon as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, gelatin, brandy, cream):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Strawberryfits better
  3. Apricotfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, gelatin, brandy, cream. 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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