Why it works: Egg and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 118,967 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓
Jelly Pie
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Make and bake the filling
In a bowl, mix the egg yolks, sugar, butter, and fruit or jelly until well combined.
Pour the mixture into a pie crust and bake until set.
Top with meringue
Whip the egg whites until stiff peaks form to make a meringue.
Spread the meringue over the baked pie and return to the oven to brown.
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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Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together98,233 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Egg yolks
- Thicken the filling as they set and add richness and color.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the filling and helps the meringue stay glossy and stable.
- Butter
- Adds fat for a smooth, tender texture in the filling.
- Fruit, preserves, or jelly
- Provides the main flavor and sweetness of the filling.
- Egg whites
- Whipped into a foam that forms the meringue topping and browns in the oven.
The step that matters
Whipping the egg whites to stiff peaks. Egg whites must be whipped until stiff peaks form to trap air. Under-whipped whites produce a runny meringue that weeps, while fat from yolks left in the bowl prevents them from foaming well.
“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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