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Dessert

Indian Baked Pudding

A baked pudding made from Indian meal, wheat flour, butter, eggs, and milk, optionally with currants and raisins.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and raisin 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 ↓

Indian Baked Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Warm the butter near the fire and add it to the Indian meal.

  2. Mix in salt and enough milk to form a batter.

Make the batter

  1. Beat the eggs very light, separating the yolks and whites.

  2. Add the yolks to the Indian batter.

  3. Fold in the whites alternately with the flour.

  4. Do not beat the mixture after adding the whites.

Bake and serve

  1. Butter a pan and pour in the batter.

  2. Bake in a moderate oven (350°F / 175°C).

  3. Stir in currants and raisins floured before baking.

  4. Serve with sweet 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. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Wheat + milktop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  4. Currant + raisintop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,180 recipes

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

  5. Wheat + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,373 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Indian meal
Forms the main body of the pudding and gives it its grainy structure.
Eggs
Yolks add richness and whites trap air that lifts and sets the pudding as it bakes.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a tender, smooth texture.
Wheat flour
Adds structure and helps the pudding hold its shape after baking.
Milk
Provides the liquid that turns the meal into a batter and keeps the pudding moist.

The step that matters

Fold in the whites gently and stop mixing once they are added. Egg whites hold air that helps the pudding rise and stay light in the oven. Beating after the whites go in knocks that air out, so the pudding bakes up dense and heavy.

Swap the currant

The recipe marks currant as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (wheat, flour, butter, egg, milk, raisin):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against wheat, flour, butter, egg, milk, raisin. 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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