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Dessert

Suet Pudding

A sweet pudding made with milk, suet, raisins, molasses, spices, flour, and baking powder, boiled for two hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg 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 ↓

Suet Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, combine milk, suet, raisins, molasses, ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, flour, and baking powder.

  2. Mix until well combined; add more flour if the mixture is not stiff enough.

  3. Pour the mixture into a pudding bag or mold.

Cook and serve

  1. Boil for two hours.

  2. Serve with hard sauce.

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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cinnamon + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Nutmeg + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,331 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Ginger + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Raisin + flourtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 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

Suet
Adds richness and moisture, and keeps the pudding tender as it cooks.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the pudding together after boiling.
Baking powder
Produces gas bubbles that help the pudding rise and lighten.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color, and a deep, rich flavor.
Raisins
Add chewy texture and concentrated sweetness throughout the pudding.

The step that matters

Mixing to the right stiffness. The batter must be stiff enough to hold its shape in the bag or mold. Too much liquid makes the pudding dense and loose, so adding flour until it is stiff prevents a soggy result.

Swap the ginger

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

  1. Clovefits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Gingerthe original
  4. Turmericfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, raisin, molasses, cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, flour. 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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