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Dessert

Plain Plum Pudding

A steamed pudding made with flour, suet, sugar, molasses, milk, fruit, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and molasses are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,225 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Plain Plum Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, combine the flour, suet, baking powder, sugar, and molasses.

  2. Add milk gradually until the mixture is soft.

  3. Stir in fruit and spices to your taste.

Steam

  1. Transfer the mixture to a pudding mold.

  2. Steam for 3.5 to 4 hours.

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. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Flour + molassestop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,429 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Provides the structure that holds the pudding together as it cooks.
Suet
Adds fat that makes the pudding rich and tender rather than dry.
Baking powder
Releases gas during cooking to lighten the pudding and help it rise.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps keep the pudding moist.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, moisture, dark color, and a deep, rich flavor.

The step that matters

Add milk gradually until the mixture is soft. Flour absorbs liquid as it sits and cooks. Adding milk a little at a time lets you stop at a soft, moist batter. Too much liquid makes the pudding heavy and dense.

“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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