Name: Carrot Plum Pudding
Ingredients: 1 pound sifted flour; 1 pound carrots, grated; ½ pound suet; 1½ pounds raisins; 1½ pounds currants; 2 teaspoons cinnamon; 2 teaspoons cloves; 2 teaspoons mace

Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Carrot Plum Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Combine the flour, grated carrots, suet, raisins, currants, cinnamon, cloves, and mace in a large bowl, and mix well until all ingredients are evenly distributed.
Transfer the mixture to a pudding mold or cloth.

Cook and serve

Boil for 4 hours.
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.

Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together14,189 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together9,075 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,390 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
Carrot + clovetop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,873 recipes

Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
Carrot + cinnamontop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together981 recipes

Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

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

What each ingredient does

Flour: Provides the main structure that holds the dense pudding together as it cooks.
Carrots: Add moisture and body, keeping the grated pudding soft and substantial.
Suet: Adds fat that enriches the batter and keeps the pudding tender and moist.
Raisins: Add concentrated sweetness and chewy texture throughout the pudding.
Currants: Add tart, concentrated fruit flavour and chewy texture throughout the pudding.
Cinnamon: Adds warm, sweet aroma that defines the spiced character of the pudding.

The step that matters

Boil for 4 hours. Long, steady heat is needed to cook the dense mixture through and set the flour and suet into a firm, sliceable pudding. Cutting the time short leaves the centre raw and doughy.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, carrot, raisin, cinnamon, clove, mace):

Figfits better
Orangefits better
Vanillafits better
Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, carrot, raisin, cinnamon, clove, mace. 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.

Cinnamon Rolls71 recipes

Red Currant Jelly65 recipes

Clove Cake53 recipes

Cinnamon Cake42 recipes

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Carrot Plum Pudding