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Dessert

Fig Pudding

A steamed pudding made with figs, sugar, treacle, milk, flour, suet, egg, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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Why it works: Fig and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 510 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓

Fig Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Mix figs, sugar, treacle, milk, flour, suet, egg, and nutmeg in a bowl.

  2. Pour the mixture into a buttered mold.

Cook

  1. Boil the pudding for 4 to 5 hours.

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. Fig + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together510 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Fig + milktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,026 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  4. Milk + beeftop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,759 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).

  5. Fig + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,192 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

Figs
Provide the main fruit flavour and moist, sweet body to the pudding.
Flour
Forms the structure that holds the pudding together as it cooks.
Beef suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and tender while steaming.
Egg
Binds the mixture and helps it set firm when cooked.
Treacle
Adds sweetness, depth and a dark color to the pudding.

The step that matters

Boil the pudding for 4 to 5 hours. Long, gentle boiling cooks the flour and egg through and sets the pudding evenly. Letting the water boil dry or drop too low can leave it heavy or underdone, so the pot must be kept topped up.

Swap the fig

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

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figthe original
  4. Lemonfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, milk, flour, beef, egg, nutmeg. 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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