Name: Plain Boiled Pudding
Ingredients: 1 cup molasses; 1 cup butter; 1 cup raisins, chopped; 1 teaspoon baking soda; 1 cup milk; sufficient flour for a stiff batter; mace, to taste; nutmeg, to taste; citron, optional

Why it works: Raisin and flour 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 ↓

Plain Boiled Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Dissolve the baking soda in the milk.
Mix in the molasses and butter.
Add enough flour to create a stiff batter.
Flavor the mixture with mace and nutmeg.
Optionally, add citron for extra flavor.
Serve with 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.

Raisin + flourtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together9,075 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,557 recipes

Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
Raisin + nutmegtop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,377 recipes

Shared aroma: alpha-terpineol (lilac, floral).
Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,623 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Swap the mace

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

Cinnamonfits better
Cardamomfits better
Clovefits better
Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against molasses, butter, raisin, milk, flour, nutmeg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.