Why it works: Apple and clove are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,774 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓
Apple Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the pastry
Mix the suet or dripping with the flour and salt on a clean surface.
Gradually add cold water to form a stiff paste.
Divide the paste into two pieces: one for the bottom crust and one for the top.
Roll each piece flat with a rolling pin, keeping the edges thinner.
Assemble the pudding
Flour a pudding cloth and place it in a colander.
Put the larger piece of paste in the cloth, then add the sliced apples.
Sprinkle the grated lemon peel, sugar, and cloves or mixed spice over the apples.
Wet the edges of the top piece of paste and place it over the apples.
Join the edges of the two pieces of paste together and dredge with flour.
Boil
Tie the cloth securely and place it in a saucepan of boiling water with a plate at the bottom.
Boil for 2 to 2.5 hours.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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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Apple + clovetop 6% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,774 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).
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Lemon + clovetop 10% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together8,150 recipes
Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
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Apple + lemontop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,551 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Flour + clovetop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together12,671 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Beef suet or dripping
- Creates a short, flaky texture in the paste as it melts and separates the layers.
- Flour
- Forms the structure of the paste that holds the apples together while boiling.
- Apples
- Provide the moist filling and the tart flavor that the sugar balances.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the apple filling and adds to the browning and flavor of the pudding.
The step that matters
Joining the edges of the paste. If the edges are not sealed tightly, boiling water can seep into the cloth and make the filling soggy and the crust waterlogged.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, flour, apple, sugar, clove):
- Raisinfits better
- Quincefits better
- Figfits better
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against beef, flour, apple, sugar, clove. 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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