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Dessert

Fig Pudding

A boiled pudding made with figs, suet, flour, bread crumbs, eggs, and milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Fig and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,026 recipes. Both carry methyl 2-methylbutyrate, which smells fruity, apple. The science ↓

Fig Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Mix the chopped figs, suet, flour, and bread crumbs in a bowl.

  2. Add the beaten eggs and enough milk to form a stiff paste.

Cook and serve

  1. Butter a mold or basin and press the mixture into it tightly.

  2. Tie the mold with a cloth and boil for 3 hours or longer.

  3. Turn out the pudding and serve with melted butter, wine sauce, or cream.

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. Fig + milktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,026 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  2. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  5. Fig + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,192 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Figs
Provide the main sweetness, flavor, and moist body of the pudding.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich as it cooks.
Flour
Gives the paste structure so the pudding holds its shape when turned out.
Eggs
Bind the mixture together and help it set as it cooks.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and add body to the stiff paste.

The step that matters

Pressing the mixture into the mold. Packing the paste tightly removes air pockets so the pudding holds together and turns out with a clean shape rather than crumbling.

Swap the fig

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, bread, egg, milk):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figthe original
  4. Datesfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, bread, egg, milk. 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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