Name: Fig Pudding
Ingredients: 1 pound figs, chopped fine; 2 cups bread crumbs, grated fine; 1 cup sugar; ½ pound suet, chopped fine; 1 egg; grated rind and juice of 1 lemon; 2 teaspoons molasses; ½ grated nutmeg; 1 tablespoon flour

Why it works: Lemon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,318 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Fig Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Combine figs, bread crumbs, sugar, suet, egg, lemon rind and juice, molasses, nutmeg, and flour in a bowl, then mix well until all ingredients are combined.
Transfer the mixture to a pudding mold.

Steam and serve

Steam for 3 hours.
Serve with lemon 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.

Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together11,318 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Fig + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together510 recipes

Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).
Nutmeg + flourtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,623 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Fig + breadtop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together374 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together9,225 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Figs: Provide the main fruit flavour and moist, sweet body to the pudding.
Bread crumbs: Add bulk and absorb moisture, giving the pudding a soft, tender crumb.
Suet: Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich during steaming.
Egg: Binds the ingredients together so the pudding holds its shape.
Flour: Helps thicken the mixture and gives it structure as it steams.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fig, bread, sugar, egg, molasses, nutmeg, flour):

Raisinfits better
Vanillafits better
Datesfits better
Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fig, bread, sugar, egg, molasses, nutmeg, flour. 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.