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Dessert

Prune Pudding

A steamed pudding made with prunes, graham flour, sweet milk, molasses, eggs, spices, and served with a butter-sugar sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Prune Pudding

Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Prune Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the pudding

  1. In a bowl, combine prunes, graham flour, sweet milk, molasses, beaten eggs, baking soda, cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg, then mix well and pour into a greased pudding mold.

  2. Steam for 2 hours.

Make the sauce

  1. For the sauce, cream the butter and sugar together.

  2. Add lemon juice and beaten egg, mixing well.

  3. Gradually add boiling water, one tablespoon at a time, until smooth.

  4. Place the sauce in hot water until heated through.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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 + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  5. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 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

Graham flour
Provides the body and structure of the pudding.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and help it set as it steams.
Baking soda
Reacts with the molasses to lighten the pudding as it cooks.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color and moisture to the pudding.
Butter
Adds richness and fat to the sauce, giving it a smooth texture.
Sugar
Sweetens the sauce and helps cream it into a light base.

The step that matters

Gradually add boiling water to the sauce. Adding the hot water slowly, a little at a time, lets the creamed butter and sugar absorb it evenly. Adding it all at once can cause the sauce to separate or turn lumpy instead of smooth.

Swap the clove

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

  1. Cardamomfits about as well
  2. Clovethe original
  3. Allspicefits about as well
  4. Gingerfits less well

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