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Dessert

Molasses Pudding

A baked pudding made with molasses, sour milk, sugar, butter, baking soda, ginger, cinnamon, flour, and egg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Ginger and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,380 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Molasses 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 the pudding

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, mix molasses, sour milk, sugar, butter, baking soda, ginger, cinnamon, flour, and the egg until well combined.

  3. Pour the mixture into a shallow tin and bake until set.

Make the sauce

  1. For the sauce, combine milk or cream, sugar, egg white, and corn starch in a saucepan.

  2. Boil the sauce for one minute, then flavor with nutmeg.

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. Ginger + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

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

  3. Cinnamon + flourtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Molasses
Provides the dark color, rich flavor and moisture of the pudding.
Sour milk
Its acidity reacts with the baking soda so the pudding rises and becomes tender.
Baking soda (saleratus)
Reacts with the acidic sour milk and molasses to release gas, helping the pudding rise.
Egg
Adds structure as it sets, binding the batter so the pudding holds together.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the pudding together as it bakes.
Corn starch (in the method)
Thickens the sauce as it boils, giving it a smooth, pourable body.

The step that matters

Boil the sauce for one minute. Corn starch only thickens fully when heated to a boil, and the sauce must be stirred to keep it smooth. Undercooked starch leaves the sauce thin and cloudy, while prolonged heat can break it down.

Swap the ginger

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Clovefits about as well
  4. Gingerthe original

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