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Dessert

Sour Cream Filling for Pie

A sweet, spiced sour cream filling for pie, with raisins and optional sherry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Sour Cream Filling for 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. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, mix together the sugar, flour, cinnamon, and cloves.

  3. Add the sour cream and the beaten yolks of the eggs.

  4. Stir in the chopped raisins.

  5. If desired, add the sherry.

  6. Pour the mixture into a pie crust.

Top and bake

  1. Beat the egg whites until stiff.

  2. Spread the stiff egg whites over the top as a meringue.

  3. Bake until set and lightly browned.

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. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Cinnamon + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Clove + raisintop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,070 recipes

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

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Sour cream
Provides moisture and a tangy flavour that sets into a rich, creamy custard.
Eggs
Yolks thicken the filling as it sets, and whites whip into the meringue topping.
Sugar
Sweetens the filling and helps the meringue brown lightly in the oven.
Flour
Stabilises the filling so it sets smoothly rather than runny.
Raisins
Add chewy texture and concentrated sweetness throughout the filling.

The step that matters

Beat the egg whites until stiff. Egg whites only hold air when fully whipped and free of yolk or grease. Under-whipped whites will weep or collapse on the meringue, and the topping will not stay light when baked.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, sugar, flour, cinnamon, raisin, egg, sherry):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cardamomfits about as well
  3. Clovethe original
  4. Allspicefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, sugar, flour, cinnamon, raisin, egg, sherry. 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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