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Fried Sour Apples

Fried sour apples sautéed in hot drippings and sweetened with sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,478 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Fried Sour Apples

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash and quarter the apples, then core them.

  2. Heat about ½ inch of hot drippings in a frying pan.

Fry and serve

  1. Add the apples and turn them until they are brown all over.

  2. Sprinkle with 2-3 tablespoons of sugar just before they are done.

  3. Serve in a vegetable dish.

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. Apple + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together16,478 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Apple and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 16,478 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

Sour apples
Acidity balances the sugar, and firm flesh holds its shape while the surface browns.
Hot drippings
Hot fat conducts heat quickly, browning the apple surfaces and adding savory flavor.
Sugar
Caramelizes on the hot surface, adding sweetness and extra browning.

The step that matters

Adding the sugar at the end. Sugar caramelizes and can scorch in hot fat. Adding it just before the apples are done lets it coat and brown the surface without burning or turning bitter.

“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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