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Dessert

Apple Snow

A dessert of steamed apples beaten with egg whites and lemon, served with cream or jelly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Apple Snow

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the apples

  1. Quarter and core two cups of sour apples (do not pare), steam or stew the apples till tender, mash through a sieve.

Make the snow

  1. Beat the whites of two eggs stiff with half a cup of powdered sugar.

  2. Add the apple and one tablespoonful of lemon juice or a grating of nutmeg. Beat till like snow.

Serve

  1. Pile in a dish with bits of bright jelly on top.

  2. Serve with or without cream.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

530Calories
17 gProtein
20 gFat
70 gCarbs

Counts 10 of 12 ingredients. The other 2 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 10 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Apple1 medium (182g)95
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Peach1 medium (150g)59
Cream1 tbsp (15ml) heavy51
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Wine2 tbsp cooking wine (30ml)25
Lemonjuice of 1 lemon (48ml)12
Vanilla1 tsp extract (4ml)12
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Waternot in our table0
Coffeenot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Norton, Caroline Trask. 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. See the original page.

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. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  2. Apple + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,501 recipes

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

  3. Vanilla + sugartop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  4. Vanilla + coffeetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,391 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

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

Vanilla and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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
Provide the fruit pulp and tart flavour that gives the dessert its body.
Eggs
Whipped whites trap air, giving the apple mixture its light, snowy structure.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the dish and helps stabilise the whipped egg whites.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the apple flavour and balances sweetness.

The step that matters

Beat the apple into the egg whites. Egg whites must be beaten stiff before the apple is added, because the foam traps air and gives the snow its light texture. Folding gently keeps that air from collapsing.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (apple, milk, vanilla, wine, sugar, cream, coffee):

  1. Strawberryfits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Bananafits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against apple, milk, vanilla, wine, sugar, cream, coffee. 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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