Why it works: Milk and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
A Boiled Suet Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Mix the eggs and flour with 1 pint of milk until very thick.
Add the remaining milk and suet, mixing well. Ensure the batter is thick.
Boil the mixture for 2 hours.
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.
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Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk and flour 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
- Eggs
- Set and bind the batter so it holds together while boiling.
- Flour
- Thickens the batter and gives the pudding its body.
- Suet
- Adds fat that enriches the pudding and keeps it tender.
- Milk
- Hydrates the flour and eggs to form the batter.
The step that matters
Mixing the eggs and flour into the first pint of milk until very thick. Starch in flour thickens when mixed with liquid, and adding the rest of the milk too early can leave lumps. Starting with a thick mixture lets the flour and eggs blend smoothly before the batter is thinned.
“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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