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Dessert

Spiced Apple Pudding

A baked pudding made with bread crumbs, apples, raisins, spices, and eggs.

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

Spiced Apple Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

  1. Scald the milk in a saucepan, then stir in the bread crumbs and scald for 1 to 2 minutes.

  2. Remove from heat.

  3. Mix in all the ingredients, adding the beaten egg whites last.

Bake

  1. Butter a pudding dish and fill it with the batter.

  2. Bake for about 40 minutes at 350°F (175°C), watching to ensure it does not brown unevenly.

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. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,598 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  4. Apple + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,774 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Raisin + clovetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,070 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Beaten yolks enrich the batter and the whites, folded in last, lighten it and help it set.
Bread crumbs
Absorb the hot milk and form the bulk and body of the pudding.
Milk
Softens the bread crumbs and adds moisture to the batter.
Sugar
Sweetens the pudding and promotes gentle browning on the surface.
Apples
Add moisture, tartness and soft texture throughout the pudding.

The step that matters

Adding the beaten egg whites last. Egg whites trap air when folded in gently, lightening the batter. Stirring them in vigorously deflates the foam, leaving a denser pudding that rises less during baking.

Swap the raisin

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Pearfits better
  4. Raisinthe original

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