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Apple Pudding

A steamed apple pudding made with apples, flour, suet, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Apple Pudding

Why it works: Flour and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 92,116 recipes. Both carry phenylacetaldehyde, which smells hawthorne, honey. The science ↓

Apple Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

Make the paste

  1. Mix flour, baking powder, and salt together in a bowl.

  2. Add chopped suet and mix well.

  3. Gradually add water to form a firm paste.

Assemble and steam

  1. Grease a basin and line it with the crust.

  2. Fill the basin with sliced apples.

  3. Cover with the remaining paste, sealing the edges.

  4. Cover with a cloth and steam for 24 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.

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.

  1. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  2. Apple + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together16,478 recipes

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

  3. Apple + beeftop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,364 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Apple + flourtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,140 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + beeftop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together10,677 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Apple and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 16,478 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

Flour
Provides starch and gluten that give the crust its structure.
Apples
Release moisture and tartness as they cook, flavouring the filling.
Beef suet
Melts during steaming, adding fat that keeps the crust tender.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the moist dough, helping the crust rise lightly.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the tart apples.

The step that matters

Gradually add water to form a firm paste. Too much water makes the paste slack and it will not hold its shape, while too little leaves it crumbly and dry. Adding water slowly lets you stop at a firm dough that holds together and seals well during steaming.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, sugar, beef):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, beef. 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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