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Dessert

Superior Treacle Pudding

A steamed pudding made with breadcrumbs, flour, suet, currants, treacle, lemon, eggs, and milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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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 ↓

Superior Treacle Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Chop the suet finely and clean the currants.

  2. If the treacle is stiff, warm it to soften.

  3. Mix all dry ingredients together in a bowl.

Make the pudding

  1. Add lemon juice, treacle, eggs, and milk to the dry mixture.

  2. Pour the mixture into a well-greased quart mold.

  3. Cover with greased paper and steam for 2 hours.

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

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

  2. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  4. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  5. Bread + nutmegtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,997 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the batter and help set the pudding as it steams.
Bread crumbs
Give the pudding body and soak up the liquid for a soft crumb.
Flour
Adds structure so the batter holds together while steaming.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich.
Treacle
Adds sweetness, dark color and a deep molasses flavor.
Baking powder
Releases gas that lifts the batter for a lighter texture.

The step that matters

Steam for 2 hours in a covered mold. Steaming gently cooks the batter through without drying it. The greased paper cover traps steam, so the pudding stays moist. Letting water run low in the pot can cause uneven cooking.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, flour, nutmeg, sugar, lemon, egg, milk):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, flour, nutmeg, sugar, lemon, 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.

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