Why it works: Flour and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,623 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Date Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Combine dates, flour, suet, sugar, nutmeg, and rum in a bowl and mix well until combined.
Place the mixture in a cloth and tie securely.
Boil in water for 3 hours.
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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Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together18,623 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Nutmeg + rumtop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together646 recipes
Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).
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Dates + nutmegtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together194 recipes
Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
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Sugar + rumtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,908 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Dates
- Provide the main body, sweetness and moisture of the pudding.
- Flour
- Helps bind the mixture so it holds together when boiled.
- Suet
- Adds fat, giving a rich, moist texture as it melts during cooking.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps balance the flavor of the dates.
- Rum
- Adds aroma and flavor depth to the pudding.
The step that matters
Tying the cloth securely. If the cloth is loose, water can seep into the pudding and make it soggy, and the mixture may spill out during the long boil.
Swap the dates
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, sugar, nutmeg, rum):
- Raisinfits better
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits better
- Datesthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, nutmeg, rum. 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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