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Dessert

Steamed Indian Pudding

A steamed pudding made with cornmeal, Graham flour, suet, and fruit, baked in a steamer.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and beef are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,759 recipes. Both carry 1-hexanal, which smells fruit. The science ↓

Steamed Indian Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Dredge the currants or raisins with a little flour after washing and drying them.

  2. In a bowl, stir together the cornmeal, Graham flour, suet, sour milk, and molasses until well combined.

  3. Add the dissolved baking soda and beat thoroughly.

  4. Fold in the dredged fruit evenly into the batter.

Steam and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into a well-oiled round pan, filling it only three-quarters full.

  2. Place the pan in a steamer, cover with an inverted pie pan, and steam for 2½ hours.

  3. Serve warm with fruit sauce, tart fruit, or lemon 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.

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

    Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).

  2. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + molassestop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,429 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Milk + curranttop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,475 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  5. Currant + molassestop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,817 recipes

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

Sour milk or buttermilk
Acid reacts with the baking soda, helping the pudding rise and giving it a tender crumb.
Coarse cornmeal
Provides the main body and structure of the pudding.
Graham flour
Adds structure and a nutty, wholesome flavor and texture to the batter.
Currants or seedless raisins
Add sweetness and pockets of chewy fruit throughout the pudding.
Beef suet
Adds fat for moisture and a rich, tender texture as it melts during steaming.
Molasses or pure syrup
Adds sweetness, depth of flavor, and moisture to the batter.

The step that matters

Fold in the dredged fruit evenly. Flouring the fruit helps it stay suspended rather than sinking to the bottom, so it spreads through the pudding. Filling the pan only three-quarters full leaves room for the batter to rise during steaming.

Swap the currant

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

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

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