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Game Pudding

A savory pudding made from boned game, bacon or suet, herbs, spices, red port, lemon juice, crumbled rolls, cream, and egg yolks.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Game Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Bone the hare or other game.

  2. Add bacon or suet, parsley, thyme, basil, shallots, garlic, beaten spices, pepper, salt, red port, and lemon juice.

  3. Cook over a fire for 10 minutes.

  4. Pound the mixture in a marble mortar.

  5. Mix in the crumbled rolls, cream, and egg yolks.

Cook and serve

  1. Put the mixture into a pudding mold or cloth.

  2. Boil for 2.5 hours.

  3. Serve with a sauce made from the bones of the game.

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. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Thyme + basiltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,768 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

  3. Parsley + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

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

  4. Thyme + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,973 recipes

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

  5. Parsley + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Hare or other game
Provides the main meat, giving the pudding its body and savoury flavour.
Bacon or beef suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich as it cooks.
French rolls
Soak up liquid and give the pudding a light, tender structure that holds it together.
Egg yolks
Bind the mixture and help it set firm as it cooks.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness, softening the texture of the pudding.
Red port
Adds sweetness and depth of flavour to the meat.

The step that matters

Boil for 2.5 hours. Boiling gently at a steady simmer cooks the egg-bound mixture through and sets it evenly. Too hard a boil or a loose wrapping can make the pudding break apart or turn watery.

Swap the garlic

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, parsley, thyme, basil, shallot, pepper, lemon):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Winter savoryfits better
  4. Garlicthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, parsley, thyme, basil, shallot, pepper, lemon. 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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