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Dessert

Plum Pudding 'without Eggs

A steamed plum pudding made with suet, bread, currants, brown sugar, brandy, and milk, without eggs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Currant and brandy are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,057 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Plum Pudding 'without Eggs

Ingredients

Directions

Mix the batter

  1. Mix the suet, grated bread, currants, brown sugar, and brandy in a large bowl.

  2. Add enough milk to create a stiff batter.

Boil

  1. Place the mixture in a cloth and tie it securely.

  2. Boil the pudding in water for 4 to 6 hours.

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. Currant + brandytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  3. Brandy + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,738 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  4. Currant + milktop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,475 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  5. Bread + brandytop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together976 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

What each ingredient does

Suet
Melts during cooking to add richness and a tender, moist crumb.
Grated bread
Absorbs liquid and gives the pudding body and structure without eggs.
Currants
Add sweetness and chewy pockets of fruit throughout the pudding.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and a molasses note while helping retain moisture.
Brandy
Adds aroma and warm flavour that stands out in the finished pudding.
Milk
Hydrates the bread and binds the mixture into a stiff, cohesive batter.

The step that matters

Tying the cloth and boiling. The cloth must be tied securely so water cannot seep in and make the pudding soggy. The pudding should stay fully submerged during the long boil so it cooks evenly.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, sugar, brandy, milk):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Apricotfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, sugar, brandy, milk. 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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