Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓
Cherry Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Preheat your oven to 350°F (175°C).
Make the pudding
In a bowl, beat the sugar and eggs until very light.
Add the bread crumbs, cinnamon, cloves, lemon peel, and cherries. Mix well.
Pour the mixture into a greased pudding dish.
Bake and serve
Bake for 2 hours in the oven.
Serve with boiling wine poured over the pudding, if desired.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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.
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Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together14,189 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
-
Cinnamon + lemontop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together7,950 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
-
Clove + lemontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together8,150 recipes
Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
-
Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together30,779 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
-
Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together22,662 recipes
Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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
- Eggs
- Bind the batter and set into a light, custard-like structure as they cook.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the pudding and helps the beaten eggs hold their lightness.
- Bread crumbs
- Absorb liquid and give the pudding body so it holds together when baked.
- Cherries
- Add fruit moisture and tart-sweet flavor that runs through the baked pudding.
The step that matters
Beating the sugar and eggs until very light. Beating air into the eggs gives the pudding its lift and tender texture. Under-beaten eggs leave a dense result, since the air trapped at this stage is what the batter relies on during the long bake.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, egg, bread, cinnamon, clove):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Figfits better
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, bread, cinnamon, clove. 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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