Skip to main content
Dessert

Raisin and Rice Pudding

A steamed pudding of rice, milk, raisins, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Rice and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,374 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Raisin and Rice Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the rice

  1. Wash and pick over the rice.

  2. Combine rice, boiling water, and salt in the upper part of a double boiler.

  3. Boil hard for 10 minutes.

Steam and serve

  1. Place over hot water and steam for 20 minutes.

  2. Add hot milk, sugar, and raisins; stir well with a fork.

  3. Steam for an additional 30 minutes.

  4. Serve hot.

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. Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  2. Rice + raisintop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together565 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Raisin + sugartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Milk + raisintop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,155 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanoic acid (acides aroma).

  5. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Rice
Forms the body of the pudding as its starch softens and absorbs the liquid.
Milk
Adds moisture and richness, and lets the rice cook into a creamy texture.
Raisins
Add chewy pockets of sweetness and moisture throughout the pudding.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the flavour of the milk and raisins.

The step that matters

Stir in the milk, sugar, and raisins with a fork. Stirring distributes the raisins and sugar evenly and breaks up rice clumps so the pudding cooks to a uniform, creamy consistency.

Swap the raisin

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, milk, sugar):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Coconutfits better
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Raisinthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, milk, sugar. 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.

You might also like

Rice CakeRice Cake120 recipesRice CreamRice Cream43 recipesRice JellyRice Jelly42 recipesRice PuddingRice Pudding22 recipes