Name: Common Baked Raisin Pudding
Ingredients: ¾ pound flour; ¾ pound raisins; 6 ounces beef suet, finely chopped; ¼ teaspoon salt; ½ teaspoon grated nutmeg; 3 eggs, whisked; ¼ pint milk (or less if eggs are large)

Why it works: Flour and raisin match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Common Baked Raisin Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Mix and bake

In a large bowl, beat together the flour, raisins, suet, salt, nutmeg, eggs, and milk until well combined.
Pour the mixture into a buttered dish.
Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes.

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.

Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together9,075 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Raisin + nutmegtop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,377 recipes

Shared aroma: alpha-terpineol (lilac, floral).
Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,623 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Beef + milktop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,759 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).
Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Flour: Provides the starch and structure that hold the pudding together as it bakes.
Eggs: Bind the mixture and set as it bakes, giving the pudding its body.
Beef suet: Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich as it cooks.
Raisins: Add pockets of sweetness and chewy texture throughout the pudding.
Milk: Adds moisture that hydrates the flour and loosens the batter.

The step that matters

Combining the batter with the milk. Eggs vary in size, so the milk amount may need adjusting. Too much liquid makes the pudding loose and slow to set, while too little leaves it dry and stiff.

Swap the nutmeg

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

Cinnamonfits about as well
Nutmegthe original
Jalapenofits less well
Turmericfits less well

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

White Cake431 recipes

Pound Cake373 recipes

Orange Bundt Cake349 recipes

Spice Cake344 recipes

Like knowing why a recipe works?

The free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.

Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.

Common Baked Raisin Pudding