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Dessert

English Plum Pudding

A steamed pudding made with suet, dried fruit, sugar, eggs, milk, brandy, nutmeg, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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

Make the pudding

  1. In a large bowl, combine the chopped suet, seeded raisins, currants, citron, sugar, eggs, milk, brandy, grated nutmeg, and salt.

  2. Gradually add flour until the mixture is very stiff.

  3. Place the mixture into one or two bags.

Cook and serve

  1. Boil the bags in a large pot of water for 7 to 8 hours.

  2. Serve with sauce.

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. Raisin + nutmegtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-terpineol (lilac, floral).

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  4. Nutmeg + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

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 it hold together as it sets.
Flour
Gives the stiff mixture structure so it holds its shape when boiled.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps keep the pudding moist.
Raisins
Add concentrated sweetness and chewy texture.
Currants
Add concentrated sweetness and chewy texture.

The step that matters

Gradually add flour until very stiff. Flour should be added slowly so the mixture reaches a very stiff texture without becoming lumpy. A stiff mixture holds its shape in the bags and cooks into a firm pudding rather than a loose batter.

Swap the currant

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

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

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