Name: Fig Pudding
Ingredients: 1 pound dried figs, chopped fine; ¾ pound bread, grated; 6 ounces moist sugar; 6 ounces beef suet, chopped fine; 1 cup milk; a little nutmeg; 1 beaten egg

Why it works: Fig and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 510 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓

Fig Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Mix the grated bread and chopped suet in a bowl.
Add the chopped figs, sugar, nutmeg, beaten egg, and milk to the mixture, and combine all ingredients thoroughly.

Cook and serve

Pour the mixture into a mold or pudding bag.
Boil for 4 hours.
Serve with sugar and butter 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.

Fig + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together510 recipes

Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).
Fig + milktop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,026 recipes

Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).
Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together11,466 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
Fig + breadtop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together374 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Beef + milktop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,759 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).

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

What each ingredient does

Bread: Forms the bulk of the pudding and absorbs moisture from the milk and egg.
Beef suet: Adds fat that enriches the texture and keeps the pudding moist as it cooks.
Dried figs: Provide the main flavour and sweetness, with body from their chopped pieces.
Beaten egg: Binds the ingredients together so the pudding holds its shape.
Moist sugar: Adds sweetness and a rich, caramel-like flavour.

Swap the nutmeg

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

Cinnamonfits about as well
Nutmegthe original
Clovefits less well
Gingerfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against fig, bread, sugar, beef, milk, egg. 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.