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Dessert

Fig Pudding

A steamed pudding made with bread crumbs, suet, milk, sugar, figs, and baking powder.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and fig are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,026 recipes. Both carry methyl 2-methylbutyrate, which smells fruity, apple. The science ↓

Fig Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Combine bread crumbs, chopped suet, milk, sugar, chopped figs, and baking powder in a bowl.

  2. Mix well and pour the mixture into a pudding mold.

  3. Steam for 2 hours until cooked through.

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. Milk + figtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,026 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  3. Bread + figtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together374 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Sugar + figtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,241 recipes

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

  5. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Bread crumbs
Provides the starchy base that absorbs the milk and gives the pudding its body.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding rich and tender as it cooks.
Milk
Supplies moisture that hydrates the crumbs and keeps the texture soft.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps browning and flavor development.
Figs
Contribute sweetness, chewy texture and fruity flavor throughout the pudding.
Baking powder
Releases gas that lifts the batter so the pudding rises and is less dense.

The step that matters

Steam for the full 2 hours. Gentle, steady moist heat cooks the pudding through evenly and sets its crumb without drying it out. Cutting the time short can leave the centre under-set and dense.

Swap the fig

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figthe original
  3. Applefits less well
  4. Peachfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, milk, sugar. 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 fig pudding recipes

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