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Dessert

English Plum Pudding

A steamed pudding made with raisins, currants, suet, candied peel, spices, and brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

English Plum Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fruit

  1. Stone and cut up the raisins without chopping them.

  2. Wash and dry the currants.

  3. Cut the candied peel into thin slices.

Mix the pudding

  1. Mix all the dry ingredients well together.

  2. Moisten the mixture with the well-beaten eggs.

  3. Stir in the flavoring and mix thoroughly.

  4. Add about ½ pound of flour.

Boil and serve

  1. Put the pudding into a stout new cloth or boil in two molds for 12 hours.

  2. Serve with rich 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. Nutmeg + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Raisin + nutmegtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,377 recipes

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

  5. Lemon + cinnamontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,950 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the mixture and add structure as the pudding sets while boiling.
Bread crumbs
Absorb liquid and give the pudding a soft, body-filled texture.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich.
Raisins
Provide sweetness, chewy texture and moisture from the dried fruit.
Moist sugar
Adds sweetness and a soft, moist crumb.
Brandy
Adds aroma and flavor to the pudding.

The step that matters

Boil for the full 12 hours. The pudding must cook long and steadily to set the egg and crumb structure and fully cook the dense mixture. Under-boiling leaves it wet and heavy in the center.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (raisin, sugar, bread, egg, lemon, nutmeg, cinnamon):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against raisin, sugar, bread, egg, lemon, nutmeg, cinnamon. 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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