Why it works: Milk and wheat are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,418 recipes. Both carry (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal, which smells cucumber, melon. The science ↓
Dora's Whortleberry Puddings
Ingredients
Directions
Make the batter
In a bowl, combine sour milk or buttermilk, baking soda, and salt.
Add enough wheat meal or Graham flour to create a thick batter.
Gently fold in the huckleberries.
Steam and serve
Pour the mixture into a two-quart basin and steam for 2 hours.
Serve with sweetened cream or your choice of sauce.
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.
-
Milk + wheattop 6% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,418 recipes
Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Sour milk or buttermilk
- Its acidity reacts with baking soda to make the pudding rise and gives it a tangy flavour.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acid in the sour milk to release gas, lifting the batter as it steams.
- Wheat meal or graham flour
- Provides the starch and gluten-forming protein that give the batter its body and structure.
- Huckleberries
- Add moisture, sweetness and a tart, fruity flavour throughout the pudding.
The step that matters
Gently fold in the huckleberries. Vigorous stirring develops gluten in the flour and can make the pudding tough and dense, and crushed berries bleed colour into the batter. Folding keeps the batter light and the berries whole.
“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.
More huckleberry pudding recipes
You might also like
Wheat Muffins48 recipes
Whole Wheat Muffins12 recipes
White Cake431 recipes
Pound Cake373 recipesThe free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.