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Dessert

Plum Pudding, Christmas

A steamed dessert made with suet, dried fruit, candied peel, flour, breadcrumbs, almonds, lemon rind, eggs, milk, brandy, sugar, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Raisin and flour match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Plum Pudding, Christmas

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Mix all the dry ingredients together.

  2. Stir in the well-beaten eggs, milk, and brandy.

  3. Turn the mixture into 2 well-buttered basins.

  4. Steam for 5 to 6 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. Raisin + flourtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Raisin + almondtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,781 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  3. Almond + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,115 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the mixture and add structure as the pudding sets during steaming.
Flour
Provides starch that gives the pudding its body and firm crumb.
Breadcrumbs
Absorb liquid and lighten the texture so the pudding is less dense.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich in texture.
Moist sugar
Adds sweetness and molasses flavour, and helps keep the pudding moist.
Milk
Adds moisture that hydrates the flour and breadcrumbs into a batter.

The step that matters

Steam for 5 to 6 hours. Steaming gently and steadily cooks the pudding through without drying it. Letting the water boil dry or the steam drop can leave the pudding heavy or undercooked in the centre.

Swap the currant

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, raisin, flour, almond, lemon, egg, nutmeg. 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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