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Dessert

Cherry Pudding

A steamed bread pudding layered with cherries.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Cherry Pudding

Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Cherry Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mixture

  1. In a large bowl, mix the bread crumbs, sugar, eggs, milk, lemon rind, cinnamon, and salt until well combined.

  2. Butter a mold and spread a thick layer of the mixture in the bottom.

Layer and steam

  1. Add a layer of cherries, then another layer of the bread mixture, and repeat until the mold is filled.

  2. Close the mold tightly and steam for 2 hours.

Serve

  1. Serve with a sweet liquid sauce.

  2. You can substitute blackberries for cherries.

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Lemon + cinnamontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,950 recipes

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

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

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

  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

Bread crumbs
Form the bulk of the pudding and soak up the milk and eggs to give body.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and help it set firm as it steams.
Milk
Moistens the bread crumbs and gives the pudding its soft, tender texture.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the tartness of the cherries.
Cherries
Provide fruit flavor and juiciness between the layers.

The step that matters

Close the mold tightly and steam for 2 hours. A tight seal keeps steam trapped around the pudding so it cooks evenly and stays moist. If steam escapes, the top can dry out and the custardy layers may set unevenly.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

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