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English Plum-pudding

A steamed pudding made with raisins, currants, suet, bread crumbs, sugar, flour, orange peel, lemon rind, eggs, brandy, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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 ↓

English Plum-pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Clean the currants and stone the raisins.

  2. Mix all the dry ingredients together in a large bowl.

Make and cook the pudding

  1. Beat the eggs and brandy together, then pour the mixture over the dry mixture.

  2. Mix thoroughly.

  3. Pack the mixture into greased molds or kettles.

  4. Cover the molds.

  5. Place the molds in a pot of boiling water.

  6. Boil for 6 hours without interruption.

  7. Boil the pudding again for 6 hours.

Finish and serve

  1. Pour brandy over the pudding.

  2. Ignite it.

  3. Serve while blazing.

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. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Raisin + nutmegtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-terpineol (lilac, floral).

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  5. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Suet
Adds fat and richness, keeping the pudding moist during long steaming.
Eggs
Bind the dry ingredients together and help set the pudding structure as it cooks.
Stale bread crumbs
Absorb the liquid and give the pudding body and a tender crumb.
Flour
Provides structure, helping the pudding hold its shape after steaming.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and a deeper, molasses-like flavor.
Brandy
Adds aroma and flavor, and is the spirit ignited at the end.

The step that matters

Keeping the water boiling for the full steaming time. Steaming for a long, uninterrupted period cooks the pudding evenly and sets its structure. If the water drops below a boil, the pudding cooks unevenly and can turn heavy or soggy.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (raisin, bread, sugar, lemon, flour, nutmeg, brandy):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against raisin, bread, sugar, lemon, flour, nutmeg, brandy. 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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