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French Black Puddings

A blood sausage made with groats or rice, pig's blood, spices, and entrails.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

French Black Puddings

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the grain

  1. Pick the groats or rice.

  2. Wash the groats or rice.

  3. Boil the groats or rice until three parts done.

  4. Drain the groats or rice.

Make the mixture

  1. Place the drained groats or rice in a stewpan with pig's blood.

  2. Stir in plenty of coarse sea salt.

  3. Add ground pepper, mace, cloves, nutmeg, allspice, cream and soaked bread crumb.

  4. Mix in chopped savory, thyme, parsley and pennyroyal.

  5. Cook over low heat for 20 minutes.

  6. Let the mixture cool.

  7. Mix in the diced flay.

Fill and cook the puddings

  1. Fill the cleaned entrails with the mixture three parts full.

  2. Tie the ends of the entrails.

  3. Boil the puddings in hot water gently for 15 minutes.

  4. Prick the puddings with a fork.

  5. Broil the puddings on a clean grill for 10 minutes.

  6. Lay the puddings on clean straw.

  7. Store the puddings.

  8. Simmer the puddings in boiling water for 10 minutes.

  9. Prick the puddings.

  10. Broil the puddings.

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. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Nutmeg + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,331 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  5. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

What each ingredient does

Groats or rice
Forms the bulk and firm body of the filling.
Pig's blood
Sets when heated, binding the filling into a firm, sliceable mass.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness, keeping the filling tender.
French bread crumb
Absorbs liquid and helps bind the mixture together.
Flay fat
Adds richness and juiciness by melting into the filling as it cooks.

The step that matters

Fill the cleaned entrails with the mixture three parts full.. The grain and bread swell as the pudding cooks. Leaving room in the casing lets the filling expand without bursting the skin.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, pepper, clove, nutmeg, allspice, cream, bread):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Cardamomfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, pepper, clove, nutmeg, allspice, cream, bread. 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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