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Dessert

Steamed Pudding

A steamed pudding made from wheatmeal, sago, egg, butter, sultanas, cinnamon, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 30,779 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Steamed Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the sago

  1. Soak the sago in a little water over low heat until almost tender.

  2. Drain any excess water from the sago.

Make and steam the pudding

  1. Mix the sago with the wheatmeal, egg, oiled butter, sultanas, cinnamon, and sugar.

  2. Pour the mixture into a small basin and tie it with a cloth.

  3. Steam the pudding for 1 hour.

Serve

  1. Serve with white 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. Cinnamon + sugartop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Butter + cinnamontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,784 recipes

    Shared aroma: anethole (sweet, anise).

  3. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

Cinnamon and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Wheatmeal
Provides the main body and structure of the pudding as its flour base.
Sago
Its starch softens and thickens during soaking, giving a tender, moist texture.
Egg
Binds the mixture and sets during steaming, holding the pudding together.
Oiled butter
Adds fat, which keeps the pudding moist and gives it a richer mouthfeel.
Sultanas
Add sweetness and moisture as they plump in the steamed pudding.

The step that matters

Drain the sago before mixing. Excess water would thin the batter and make the pudding soggy, so the sago must be drained well before it is combined with the other ingredients.

Swap the cinnamon

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

  1. Cinnamonthe original
  2. Nutmegfits about as well
  3. Capersfits less well
  4. Parsleyfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, butter, 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.

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