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Dessert

Sweet Stuffing

A sweet stuffing made with raisins, nutmeg, salt, pepper, egg, water, and fat, baked in a heart.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Raisin and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,377 recipes. Both carry alpha-terpineol, which smells lilac, floral. The science ↓

Sweet Stuffing

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Wash and rinse the heart thoroughly, then let it drip and dry completely.

  2. Mix all other ingredients together, adding a little water to the egg.

  3. Fill the heart with the mixture and sew loose parts firmly to keep it in position.

Bake

  1. Spread dripping generously over the heart and bake at 300°F (150°C) for 2 hours.

  2. Baste frequently as there is not much fat on the heart.

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

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

  2. Nutmeg + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Nutmeg + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together24,744 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  4. Raisin + eggtop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,556 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Raisin + peppertop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together582 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

Nutmeg and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 24,744 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

Sultana raisins
Add sweetness and chewy moisture to the stuffing.
Egg
Binds the stuffing mixture together so it holds its shape.
Dripping
Adds fat that browns the outside and keeps the heart moist as it bakes.

The step that matters

Baste frequently. The heart has little fat of its own, so it can dry out during the long bake. Regular basting with the dripping keeps the surface moist and helps it brown evenly.

Swap the raisin

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

  1. Lemonfits better
  2. Limefits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Raisinthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against nutmeg, pepper, egg. 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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