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Dessert

Brown Pudding

A steamed pudding made with molasses, suet, flour, raisins, and sour milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Brown Pudding

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 ↓

Brown Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. In a large bowl, mix molasses, suet, baking soda, flour, raisins, sour milk, and salt until well combined.

  2. Pour the mixture into a greased pudding mold.

  3. Cover the mold with a lid or foil.

Steam and serve

  1. Steam the pudding for 3 hours.

  2. Serve with butter 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.

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.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Molasses + raisintop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,577 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Raisin + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,155 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanoic acid (acides aroma).

  5. Molasses + flourtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,429 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

Flour
Forms the starch and gluten structure that holds the pudding together.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acid in sour milk to release gas that lightens the pudding.
Sour milk
Its acidity activates the baking soda and adds moisture to a tender crumb.
Suet
Solid fat that melts during steaming, adding richness and a moist, tender texture.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color, and moisture.

The step that matters

Steam with the lid sealed. The pudding cooks gently by trapped steam over a long period. If the lid or foil lets steam escape or the water boils dry, the pudding can cook unevenly and turn out dense or underdone.

“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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