Why it works: Milk and corn are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,955 recipes. Both carry hexanal, which smells green, grassy. The science ↓
Suet and Sago Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Soak sago in cold water for 4 hours.
Heat milk almost to a boil, then stir in soaked sago.
Add bread crumbs to the mixture.
In a bowl, beat eggs and sugar for 1 minute.
Combine egg mixture with suet, sago, corn starch, and salt.
Butter a pudding mold and pour in the mixture.
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.
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Milk + corntop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,955 recipes
Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).
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Bread + milktop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together11,466 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
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Sugar + raisintop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together12,481 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together22,662 recipes
Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
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Corn + raisintop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together180 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
Swap the raisin
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, milk, sugar, egg, corn):
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits better
- Coconutfits about as well
- Raisinthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against bread, milk, sugar, egg, corn. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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