Name: Fruit Batter Pudding
Ingredients: light batter; 1 quart ripe cherries or gooseberries; a few apples, cut up; 2 teaspoons moist sugar; 1 teaspoon ginger; 1 teaspoon nutmeg

Why it works: Ginger and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,324 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Fruit Batter Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

Prepare a light batter.
Grease a deep dish.

Assemble and bake

Pour in half of the batter.
Add the cherries or gooseberries, apples, sugar, ginger, and nutmeg.
Top with the remaining batter.
Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven for a little over an hour.

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.

Ginger + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together3,324 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Apple + gingertop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,424 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Apple + nutmegtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,790 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Sugar + gingertop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together14,054 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
Apple + sugartop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together16,478 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Sugar and ginger barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 14,054 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

Light batter: Bakes around the fruit to form a light, tender pudding that holds the filling together.
Cherries or gooseberries: Add moisture and tartness, which balance the sweetness of the batter and sugar.
Apples: Add moisture and body to the filling as they soften in the oven.
Moist sugar: Adds sweetness and helps the top brown as it bakes.
Ginger: Adds warm, spicy aroma to the fruit filling.
Nutmeg: Adds warm, sweet aroma that complements the fruit and spices.