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Dessert

Brandy Pudding

A layered pudding made with raisins, French roll, macaroons, brandy, eggs, milk, nutmeg, and lemon rind, boiled for an hour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Brandy Pudding

Why it works: Nutmeg and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,318 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Brandy Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Assemble and soak

  1. Line a mold with chopped raisins or cherries, then with slices of French roll, followed by layers of ratifia or macaroons, fruit, rolls, and cakes until full.

  2. Sprinkle 2 glasses of brandy over the layers.

  3. Beat the yolks and whites of 4 eggs.

  4. In a bowl, combine 1 pint of lightly sweetened milk or cream with grated nutmeg and lemon rind.

  5. Pour the mixture over the layered ingredients and let it soak.

Boil and serve

  1. Flour a cloth, tie it over the mold, and boil for 1 hour, keeping the mold upright.

  2. Serve with pudding sauce.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Nutmeg + lemontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Raisin + nutmegtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-terpineol (lilac, floral).

  3. Raisin + brandytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,768 recipes

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

  4. Raisin + lemontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,742 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Raisin + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,155 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanoic acid (acides aroma).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the custard and help it set firmly when heated.
Milk or cream
Provides the liquid base that soaks the layers and moistens the pudding.
French roll
Absorbs the milk and brandy, giving the pudding its soft body.
Raisins or cherries
Add sweetness and chewy fruit texture throughout the layers.
Brandy
Adds a warm, aromatic flavour that soaks through the layers.

The step that matters

Boiling the floured cloth-wrapped mold. Steady boiling water and steam heat the custard evenly so it sets through. If the cloth is loose or the mold tips, water can seep in and make the pudding soggy.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Currantfits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against raisin, brandy, egg, milk, 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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