Why it works: Raisin and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,390 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-ol, which smells mushroom, earthy. The science ↓
Plum Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the ingredients
Wash and stone the raisins.
Rub the butter into the wheatmeal.
Mix together the raisins, butter, wheatmeal, cinnamon, sugar, and breadcrumbs.
Boil the sago in ½ cup of milk until soft, adding water as needed.
Mix the sago with the other ingredients.
Make the pudding
Beat the eggs and add them to the mixture, then mix well.
If the mixture is too dry, add enough milk to moisten it.
Fill a buttered pudding basin with the mixture, tie it with a pudding cloth, and steam for 3 hours.
Serve
Serve with a sweet white sauce.
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.
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Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,390 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Cinnamon + milktop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together12,655 recipes
Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
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Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together30,779 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Raisin + sugartop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together12,481 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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
- Wholemeal breadcrumbs
- Form the bulk of the pudding and absorb moisture from the other ingredients.
- Eggs
- Bind the mixture and set during steaming to hold the pudding together.
- Sago
- Softens into the mixture, adding body and a tender, slightly sticky texture.
- Butter
- Coats the flour and adds richness and a tender crumb.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the pudding brown slightly.
- Raisins
- Add concentrated sweetness and chewy bursts of fruit throughout the pudding.
The step that matters
Steaming the pudding. Steam must be kept steady and the basin sealed so the eggs set gently and the pudding stays moist. Too little water or heat lets it dry out or turn heavy.
Swap the raisin
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, egg, cinnamon, milk):
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits about as well
- Raisinthe original
- Applefits about as well
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, cinnamon, milk. 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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