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Dessert

Graham Pudding

A steamed pudding made with graham flour, raisins, molasses, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and raisin match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Graham Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the batter

  1. Mix the Graham flour, brown sugar, and salt in a bowl, then add the raisins.

  2. Combine the well-beaten egg and milk in another bowl, then add the molasses and melted butter.

  3. Dissolve the baking soda in boiling water, add it to the mixture, and stir well.

Steam the pudding

  1. Pour the batter into a well-greased mold.

  2. Steam as you would for a fruit pudding.

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. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  3. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Raisin + molassestop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,577 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Graham flour
Provides the bulk and structure of the pudding, with a coarse, wholesome texture.
Egg
Binds the batter and helps give the steamed pudding its set structure.
Molasses
Adds moisture, dark colour and a deep, sweet flavour.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a tender crumb.
Baking soda
Reacts with the molasses's acidity to produce gas that lightens the batter.

The step that matters

Dissolving the baking soda in boiling water before adding it. Baking soda needs to be fully dissolved so it spreads evenly through the batter. Clumps can leave pockets of bitter flavour and uneven rising.

Swap the raisin

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

  1. Raisinthe original
  2. Vanillafits about as well
  3. Figfits less well
  4. Peachfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, egg, milk, molasses, 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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