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Dessert

Cumberland Pudding

A sweet breadcrumb pudding baked with milk, eggs, sugar, vanilla, currants, raisins, nutmeg, and cinnamon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Cumberland Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Grease a pudding dish with butter.

Make and bake

  1. In a bowl, combine breadcrumbs, milk, sugar, and eggs. Mix well.

  2. Stir in vanilla, currants, raisins, nutmeg, and cinnamon.

  3. Pour the mixture into the prepared dish.

  4. Bake for 45 minutes or until set and golden brown.

  5. Let cool slightly before serving.

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 + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Vanilla + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-methoxybenzaldehyde (sweet, anise).

  4. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set the custard as they cook, binding the bread and milk into a firm, sliceable pudding.
Breadcrumbs
Soak up the milk and egg mixture, giving the pudding its body and soft texture.
Milk
Moistens the breadcrumbs and forms the custard base with the eggs.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the top brown during baking.
Raisins
Add chewy pockets of concentrated sweetness throughout the pudding.

The step that matters

Bake until set and golden brown. Eggs thicken as their proteins coagulate with heat. Underbaking leaves a runny centre, while overbaking can make the custard grainy and dry, so check for a firm centre rather than relying on time alone.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, sugar, egg, vanilla, raisin, nutmeg, cinnamon):

  1. Figfits better
  2. Blueberryfits better
  3. Coconutfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, sugar, egg, vanilla, raisin, nutmeg, cinnamon. 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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