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Dessert

Fruit Pudding, Corn-meal

A sweet pudding made with cornmeal, milk, molasses, and fruit or apple.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and apple are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,104 recipes. Both carry 4-heptenal, which smells creamy, biscuit. The science ↓

Fruit Pudding, Corn-meal

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, stir hot milk into sifted cornmeal until the batter is stiff.

  2. Add salt, molasses, and baking soda dissolved in a little water.

  3. Fold in whortleberries or chopped sweet apple.

Cook

  1. Tie the mixture in a wet cloth, leaving room for it to swell, or place it in a pudding pan and cover with a cloth.

  2. Boil for three hours in water that is already boiling.

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. Milk + appletop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,104 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  2. Milk + molassestop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,243 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  3. Molasses + appletop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together970 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Cornmeal
Forms the stiff base and sets into the body of the pudding as it cooks.
Hot milk
Hydrates the cornmeal and adds moisture so the batter can be stirred and cooked through.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color, and a rich, slightly bitter flavor.
Baking soda
Reacts with the molasses's acidity to lighten the pudding and help it swell.
Whortleberries or chopped sweet apple
Adds fruit moisture, sweetness, and flavor throughout the pudding.

The step that matters

Leave room for the pudding to swell. Baking soda reacting with molasses releases gas, and the cornmeal batter expands as it cooks. If the cloth or pan is packed too tightly, the pudding can be pressed dense or burst its wrapping. Allowing space lets it rise evenly.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, molasses):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, molasses. 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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