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Dessert

Golden Cornmeal Pudding

A steamed pudding made from milk, cornmeal, molasses, ginger, cinnamon, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Ginger and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,380 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Golden Cornmeal Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the pudding

  1. Scald the milk and pour it over the cornmeal, mixing well.

  2. Add the salt, ginger, cinnamon, molasses, and the slightly beaten egg.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake for 3 hours in a 300°F (150°C) oven, placing the pudding dish in a pan of hot water.

  2. Serve hot or cold with 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. Ginger + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Molasses + cinnamontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,928 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Molasses + gingertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Cornmeal
Forms the thick body of the pudding as it absorbs the hot milk and sets during baking.
Milk
Provides the liquid that the cornmeal absorbs, creating a creamy, moist texture.
Molasses
Adds sweetness and a deep color and flavor as it bakes.
Egg
Binds the pudding and helps it set into a firm custard-like texture.

The step that matters

Baking in a water bath. Setting the dish in a pan of hot water moderates the oven heat around the pudding, so the custard cooks gently and evenly instead of drying or cracking at the edges.

Swap the ginger

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Clovefits better
  3. Allspicefits about as well
  4. Gingerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, molasses, egg, cinnamon. 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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