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Dessert

Biscuit Pudding

A sweet pudding made by soaking stale biscuits in milk, mixing with eggs, butter, dried fruit, spices, and alcohol, then baking.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Biscuit and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 368 recipes. Both carry maltol, which smells caramel, sweet. The science ↓

Biscuit Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the soak

  1. Boil the milk and let it cool.

  2. Break the stale biscuits into pieces.

  3. Add the macaroons and ratafias, along with any broken bits of sponge cake or pastry.

  4. Pour the milk over the broken bits and let them soak.

  5. Add sugar to taste.

Make the paste

  1. Beat all the ingredients over a slow fire until they form a thick paste.

  2. Remove from heat.

  3. Beat the eggs.

  4. Add the eggs to the mixture.

  5. Add the butter.

  6. Mix well.

Add the fruit and flavour

  1. Wash and dry the sultanas and currants.

  2. Add the sultanas and currants.

  3. Grate a little nutmeg over the mixture.

  4. Add the brandy or rum.

  5. Mix well.

Bake

  1. Put the mixture in a buttered mold.

  2. Bake.

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. Biscuit + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together368 recipes

    Shared aroma: maltol (caramel, sweet).

  2. Currant + brandytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

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

  4. Milk + nutmegtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,685 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Nutmeg + brandytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,311 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the mixture and help it set firm when baked.
Stale sweet biscuits
Form the bulk of the pudding and absorb the milk to make a soft paste.
Milk
Softens the biscuits so they can be beaten into a paste and adds moisture.
Butter
Adds richness and a tender texture to the pudding.
Sultanas and currants
Add sweetness, chewy texture and bursts of fruit flavour throughout.
Brandy or rum
Adds aroma and warm flavour that carries through the baked pudding.

The step that matters

Beat over a slow fire to a thick paste. Heating the soaked biscuits gently lets them thicken into an even paste without scorching. Too high a heat can catch the bottom of the pan, while stopping too early leaves the mixture loose, so the pudding may not hold its shape when baked.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Currantthe original

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