Why it works: Ginger and cinnamon 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
Make the custard
Heat the milk in a saucepan.
Stir in the cornmeal mixed with a little cold milk.
Let it boil for 2 minutes.
Finish and bake
Once cooled, add the molasses, suet, egg, ginger, cinnamon, and salt.
Pour the mixture into a baking dish and bake.
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.
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Ginger + cinnamontop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together6,380 recipes
Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
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Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together12,655 recipes
Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
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Molasses + cinnamontop 11% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together4,928 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Molasses + gingertop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together4,116 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Cornmeal
- Thickens the milk into a firm, spoonable pudding as it cooks.
- Egg
- Binds the mixture and helps it set as it bakes.
- Molasses
- Adds sweetness and deep flavour, and darkens the pudding.
- Suet
- Adds fat, giving the pudding a richer, moister texture.
- Milk
- Forms the liquid base that the cornmeal thickens.
The step that matters
Stirring the cornmeal into the milk. Cornmeal added to hot liquid without a cold-milk slurry first can clump, leaving lumps. Mixing it with a little cold milk before stirring it in lets the starch disperse evenly so the pudding thickens smoothly.
Swap the ginger
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, molasses, egg, cinnamon):
- Nutmegfits better
- Clovefits better
- Allspicefits about as well
- Gingerthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against milk, molasses, 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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