Why it works: Raisin and flour match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Black Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Make the pudding
Combine raisins, sour milk, flour, cooking molasses, baking soda, butter, cinnamon, and whiskey in a bowl, and mix until well combined.
Pour the mixture into a steaming dish.
Steam and serve
Steam for 3 hours without opening the lid.
Serve with any rich sauce.
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.
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Raisin + flourtop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together9,075 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,390 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together17,341 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together12,655 recipes
Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Flour
- Forms the main structure of the pudding as it steams.
- Cooking molasses
- Adds sweetness, dark colour and moisture to the batter.
- Sour milk
- Its acidity reacts with baking soda to help the pudding rise.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acidic sour milk to produce gas that lightens the batter.
- Raisins
- Add chewy texture and concentrated sweetness throughout the pudding.
- Butter
- Adds richness and fat, giving a softer, moister crumb.
The step that matters
Steam without opening the lid. Lifting the lid lets steam escape and the temperature drop, which can stall rising and leave the pudding dense and uneven. Keep the lid closed for the full 3 hours so the steam stays steady.
“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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