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Dessert

Pumpkin Pie

A baked pie made with mashed pumpkin, butter, molasses, sugar, flour, whisky, cinnamon, cream, and eggs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Pumpkin and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,744 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-ol, which smells mushroom, earthy. The science ↓

Pumpkin 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 the filling

  1. Stew and mash the pumpkin.

  2. While still hot, add the butter, molasses, sugar, flour, whisky, and cinnamon.

  3. Mix well, then fold in the cream and beaten eggs.

Bake

  1. Pour the mixture into pie crusts.

  2. Bake at 350°F (175°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. Pumpkin + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,744 recipes

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

  2. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  5. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Pumpkin
Provides the bulk and body of the filling.
Eggs
Set when baked, giving the filling its structure and custard-like firmness.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, tender texture to the filling.
Sugar
Sweetens the filling and helps it brown during baking.
Flour
Thickens the filling so it holds its shape once set.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Folding in the beaten eggs. Eggs set into a firm custard only when the filling is evenly combined and then baked until set. Under-baking leaves the filling loose, while overbaking can make it curdle or crack.

Swap the pumpkin

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, molasses, sugar, flour, whisky, cinnamon, cream):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, molasses, sugar, flour, whisky, cinnamon, cream. 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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