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Dessert

Spice Pudding

A sweet pudding made with raisins, currants, suet, molasses, flour, sour milk, spices, and baked in a cloth bag.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Spice Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the pudding

  1. In a large bowl, combine raisins, currants, suet, molasses, flour, sour milk, baking soda, cream of tartar, allspice, and cloves.

  2. Mix well until all ingredients are combined.

  3. Place the mixture in a cloth bag and tie it tightly.

Cook and serve

  1. Boil the bag in water for 4 hours.

  2. Serve with 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.

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. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Raisin + flourtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  4. Currant + allspicetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,359 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl benzoate (fruity, sweet).

  5. Raisin + allspicetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,475 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Provides the bulk structure that holds the pudding together after boiling.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk and molasses to produce gas that lightens the pudding.
Cream of tartar
Adds acidity that works with the baking soda to help the pudding rise.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich as it cooks.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color, and moisture to the pudding.

The step that matters

Tying the cloth bag. If the bag is not tied tightly, water can seep in during boiling and make the pudding soggy and dense. Leaving some room for the pudding to expand also matters, since the batter rises as it cooks.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (raisin, molasses, flour, milk, cream, allspice, clove):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against raisin, molasses, flour, milk, cream, allspice, 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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