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Dessert

Fig Pudding

A steamed pudding made with figs, suet, bread crumbs, brown sugar, eggs, lemon, molasses, nutmeg, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,318 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Fig Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Combine figs, suet, bread crumbs, brown sugar, and flour in a bowl.

  2. Add eggs, lemon rind and juice, molasses, and nutmeg; mix well.

  3. Pour mixture into a greased mold.

Cook and serve

  1. Steam for 3 hours.

  2. Serve hot with a boiled lemon-flavored 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. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Fig + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together510 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Fig + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together374 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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 steams.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and give the pudding its structure as it sets.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and add body, giving the pudding a soft, cake-like crumb.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and a molasses-like depth of flavor.
Figs
Provide the main fruit flavor and chewy, sweet pieces throughout.

The step that matters

Steam for 3 hours. Steaming gently and steadily cooks the pudding through without drying it out. The water level and steam must be kept up for the full time, because stopping early leaves the center wet and underset.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fig, bread, sugar, egg, molasses, nutmeg, flour):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Datesfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fig, bread, sugar, egg, molasses, 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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