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Dessert

Banana Pie

A baked pie made with sliced raw bananas, butter, sugar, allspice, and vinegar or boiled cider or diluted jelly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,548 recipes. Both carry 2-methylbutyl acetate, which smells fruit. The science ↓

Banana 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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

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

  2. Slice the raw bananas and place them in a bowl.

  3. Add the butter, sugar, allspice, and vinegar (or boiled cider or diluted jelly) to the bananas. Mix well until combined.

Assemble and bake

  1. Pour the banana mixture into one pie crust.

  2. Cover with the second pie crust and seal the edges.

  3. Bake in the preheated oven for 30-40 minutes or until the crust is golden brown.

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. Allspice + vinegartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,548 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyl acetate (fruit).

  2. Banana + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,536 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

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

  4. Banana + allspicetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together59 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl benzoate (fruity, sweet).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Raw bananas
Provide the main filling, softening as they bake into a tender, spoonable texture.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, helping the filling taste rounded and the crust brown well.
Sugar
Sweetens the filling and helps the juices thicken and caramelize slightly as it bakes.
Allspice
Adds warm, aromatic spice flavour that complements the bananas.
Vinegar
Adds a touch of acidity that brightens the sweet banana filling and balances its flavour.

The step that matters

Seal the edges of the top crust. A tight seal keeps the juices from leaking out during baking, so the filling stays moist and the pie does not boil over or dry out in the oven.

Swap the allspice

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (banana, butter, sugar, vinegar):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Tarragonfits about as well
  3. Peppermintfits about as well
  4. Allspicethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against banana, butter, sugar, vinegar. 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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