Skip to main content
Dessert

Strawberry Pie

A fruit pie with a buttery strawberry filling topped with meringue.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Sugar and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Strawberry Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the crust

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Line a pan with the pie crust.

  3. Bake the crust until golden.

Make the strawberry filling

  1. Wash and hull the strawberries.

  2. Cover the strawberries with 1 cup of granulated sugar.

  3. Simmer the strawberries for 10 minutes.

  4. Mix the butter with cornstarch.

  5. Add the butter‑cornstarch mixture to the strawberries and cook for an additional 3 minutes.

  6. Let the strawberry mixture cool.

  7. Fill the baked pie shell with the cooled strawberry mixture.

Top with meringue and brown

  1. Beat the egg whites until stiff.

  2. Gradually add powdered sugar and vanilla to the egg whites, beating well.

  3. Spread the meringue over the pie.

  4. Brown the meringue in the oven.

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. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  2. Butter + vanillatop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,050 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Sugar and vanilla 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

Strawberries
Provide the main fruit flavor and bulk of the filling.
Granulated sugar
Sweetens the berries and draws out their juice during cooking.
Cornstarch
Thickens the strawberry juices into a sliceable filling.
Eggs
Whites whip into a foam that forms the structure of the meringue.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the meringue and helps it hold a smooth, stable texture.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth finish to the filling.

The step that matters

Beat the egg whites until stiff. Egg whites need to be whipped to stiff peaks with no trace of fat or yolk, because fat blocks foaming. A stable foam gives the meringue its height and keeps it from weeping or collapsing in the oven.

“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.

You might also like

Vanilla Ice CreamVanilla Ice Cream108 recipesWhite CakeWhite Cake431 recipesPound CakePound Cake373 recipesOrange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipes