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Dessert

Date Pudding

A steamed pudding made with dates, flour, spices, molasses, milk, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Date Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, mix together the flour, nutmeg, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, cloves, and melted butter.

  2. Add the stoned and chopped dates, milk, and molasses to the dry ingredients and mix well.

Steam and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into a greased pudding mold.

  2. Cover the mold tightly and steam for 2 hours.

  3. Let it cool slightly before serving.

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. Nutmeg + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Nutmeg + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Dates + cinnamontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together283 recipes

    Shared aroma: anethole (sweet, anise).

  5. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Provides the starch structure that holds the pudding together as it steams.
Dates
Add moisture and natural sweetness, giving the pudding its dense, moist body.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, deep flavour and moisture, and helps the pudding brown slightly.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic molasses to produce gas that lightens the pudding.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a tender crumb.
Milk
Hydrates the flour and dissolves the sugars, forming the batter's moist base.

The step that matters

Cover the mold tightly and steam for 2 hours. If the lid or cover is loose, steam escapes and the pudding dries out or cooks unevenly. Steady, sealed steam heat cooks the batter gently and keeps it moist.

Swap the dates

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, nutmeg, milk, cinnamon, molasses, clove, butter):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, nutmeg, milk, cinnamon, molasses, clove, butter. 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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