Why it works: Apple and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,598 recipes. Both carry methyl cinnamate, which smells strawberry. The science ↓
Baked Apple Dumplings
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Make the dough
Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
In a bowl, mix flour, baking powder, and salt.
Cut in butter until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs.
Stir in milk to form a dough.
Roll out the dough and cut it into squares.
Fill and wrap the apples
Pare and core the apples.
Fill each apple with sugar and cinnamon, and add a small piece of butter.
Wrap each apple in a square of dough, sealing the edges.
Dampen the tops with milk and press to seal.
Bake and serve
Bake for 25 minutes, or until the apples are tender.
Serve with molasses sauce.
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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Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,598 recipes
Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).
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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together17,341 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together12,655 recipes
Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
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Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked 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
- All-purpose flour
- Forms the dough structure that wraps and holds the apple during baking.
- Butter
- Cut into the flour to create a tender, flaky texture in the dough.
- Baking powder
- Releases gas in the dough so it rises and lightens as it bakes.
- Milk
- Hydrates the flour to form the dough and adds moisture and browning.
- Sour apples
- Provide the filling, softening as they bake while their tartness balances the sweetness.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the apple filling and helps it caramelise slightly as it bakes.
The step that matters
Sealing the dough around the apples. If the edges are not pressed tightly, the dough can split or leak during baking, letting filling escape and the dough dry out or brown unevenly.
Swap the apple
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, butter, milk, sugar, cinnamon, molasses, sauce):
- Raisinfits better
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits better
- Applethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, milk, sugar, cinnamon, molasses, sauce. 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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