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Dessert

Pumpkin Pie

A baked pie made with cooked pumpkin, milk, molasses or sugar, spices, egg, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and ginger match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,380 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Pumpkin Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the filling

  1. Cook and strain the pumpkin through a sieve.

  2. In a bowl, combine the strained pumpkin and milk.

  3. Add molasses or sugar, salt, cinnamon, ginger, and the egg.

  4. Mix in the flour until well combined.

Bake

  1. Pour the mixture into a pie crust and bake at 400°F (200°C) until set.

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. Cinnamon + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Pumpkin + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,744 recipes

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

  3. Cinnamon + flourtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Pumpkin + gingertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,158 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Pumpkin
Forms the bulk of the filling and provides moisture and body.
Milk
Adds moisture and richness, helping the filling set smoothly as it bakes.
Egg
Sets the custard-like filling as it heats, giving it structure.
Flour
Thickens the filling so it holds its shape when sliced.
Molasses or sugar
Adds sweetness and depth of flavor to the filling.

The step that matters

Bake until set. The egg proteins coagulate as the filling heats, so the pie must bake until set; pulling it too early leaves a loose, runny center, while overbaking can cause cracking and a grainy texture.

Swap the pumpkin

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, molasses, cinnamon, ginger, egg, flour):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Pumpkinthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, molasses, cinnamon, ginger, egg, flour. 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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