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Dessert

Indian Pudding

A baked pudding made from Indian meal, butter, sugar, milk, eggs, and raisins.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Indian Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the base

  1. Combine hot water and Indian meal in a pot, stirring until thickened.

  2. Add butter, salt, and brown sugar; mix well.

  3. Once cool, stir in milk and beaten eggs.

Bake and serve

  1. Pour mixture into a baking dish.

  2. Add cold milk to the baking dish.

  3. Bake at 300°F (150°C) for 5 to 6 hours.

  4. Add raisins halfway through baking.

  5. As it dries, add more milk as needed.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Sugar + raisintop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Milk + raisintop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,155 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanoic acid (acides aroma).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Indian meal
Thickens the mixture and gives the pudding its body as it cooks.
Eggs
Set the custard so the pudding holds together when baked.
Milk
Provides moisture and creaminess as the pudding bakes.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and a molasses-like depth of flavour.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smoother texture.
Raisins
Add pockets of chewy sweetness throughout the pudding.

The step that matters

Long, low baking. Slow baking at a low temperature lets the cornmeal swell and the eggs set gently, keeping the pudding creamy rather than curdled or dry. Adding milk as it dries replaces moisture lost during the long bake.

Swap the raisin

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits about as well
  3. Coconutfits about as well
  4. Raisinthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, milk, egg. 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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