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Dessert

Graham Pudding

A steamed and baked pudding made with sour milk, molasses, raisins, bread crumbs, graham flour, butter, salt, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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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 ↓

Graham Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, mix sour milk, molasses, melted butter, salt, and baking soda.

  2. Stir in raisins, bread crumbs, and graham flour until well combined.

Steam and dry

  1. Pour the mixture into a steamer and steam for three hours.

  2. After steaming, place the pudding in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 15 minutes to dry off.

Serve

  1. Serve with lemon 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. Raisin + flourtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

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

  4. Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour 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

Sour milk
Its acidity reacts with baking soda to produce gas that lightens the pudding.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk to produce carbon dioxide, helping the pudding rise.
Graham flour
Provides the bulk and structure of the pudding, with its coarse bran adding texture.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color, and moisture to the pudding.
Bread crumbs
Absorb liquid and add body, giving the pudding a tender, moist crumb.

The step that matters

Steaming for three hours. The pudding must stay covered and steam at a steady gentle heat so it cooks through and stays moist. Letting the water boil dry or the steamer run low can leave the pudding dense or undercooked in the centre.

“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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