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Dessert

Lincolnshire Frumenty

A sweet wheat and milk pudding with raisins, currants, eggs, sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg, served cold.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Lincolnshire Frumenty

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Stir the wheat mush and milk over the fire until thick and smooth.

  2. Add the mixed raisins and currants, and cook until tender while stirring.

  3. Stir in the beaten egg yolks, sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

  4. Serve cold in bowls or cups.

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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Wheat + cinnamontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together537 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

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

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Wheat mush
Forms the thick, porridge-like base that gives the dish its body.
Milk
Adds moisture and softness, thinning the wheat into a smooth, creamy texture.
Egg yolks
Thicken the mixture slightly and add richness and a custard-like smoothness.
Mixed raisins and currants
Add sweetness and chewy texture as they soften during cooking.

The step that matters

Stir in the beaten egg yolks. Egg yolks thicken when heated, but if the mixture is too hot when they go in, they can scramble into lumps. Stirring steadily and keeping the heat moderate keeps the texture smooth.

Swap the currant

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against wheat, milk, raisin, egg, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg. 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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