Why it works: Beef and milk 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 ↓
Suet Puddings
Ingredients
Directions
Make the dough
In a large bowl, mix the chopped suet and flour together.
Add the beaten eggs and salt, then gradually mix in enough milk to form a dough.
Cook and serve
Shape the mixture into a pudding and place it in a cloth or pudding mold.
Boil for 4 hours in a pot of water.
Slice and fry the pudding the next day, serving with salt or sugar as desired.
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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Beef + milktop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,759 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).
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Flour + milktop 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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Egg + milktop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Beef + flourtop 25% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together10,677 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
- Beef suet
- Adds fat that keeps the pudding rich and moist as it cooks.
- All-purpose flour
- Forms the bulk structure of the dough, setting firm when cooked.
- Eggs
- Bind the dough and help it hold its shape during boiling.
The step that matters
Boiling the pudding. The pudding must be boiled for the full time in enough water to cook through evenly. Water that drops below a simmer or is left unchecked can leave the centre dense and undercooked.
“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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