Why it works: Raisin and flour match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Suet Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Make the pudding
In a bowl, combine suet, raisins, sour milk, molasses, baking soda, and salt.
Gradually add flour until the batter is thick.
Pour the mixture into a pudding dish.
Boil for three hours in a steamer.
Make the sauce
For the pudding sauce, mix sugar, butter, and flour in a saucepan.
Add boiling water and stir until thickened.
Flavor with cherry or berry juice and bring to a boil before serving.
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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Raisin + flourtop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together9,075 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Raisin + sorghumtop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together28 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Sorghum + flourtop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together99 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Beef + milktop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,759 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).
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Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Milk and flour 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
- Beef suet
- Provides fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich as it steams.
- Sour milk
- Its acidity reacts with the baking soda so the pudding rises and stays tender.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acidic sour milk to produce gas that leavens the batter.
- Flour
- Forms the structure that sets the batter as it steams.
- Sorghum or orleans molasses
- Adds sweetness, dark color, and moisture to the pudding.
The step that matters
Boil for three hours in a steamer. The pudding must steam gently and steadily for the full time so the batter cooks through and sets. Too little heat or time leaves it dense and wet in the center.
“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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