Name: Apple Charlotte
Ingredients: 2 dozen apples; 4 cups bread crumbs; 1 cup sugar; 1 ounce dripping (or butter)

Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Apple Charlotte

Ingredients

2 dozen apples
4 cups bread crumbs
1 cup sugar
1 ounce dripping (or butter)

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

Peel, core, and slice the apples.
In a bowl, mix the apples with sugar.
Grease a baking dish with dripping.

Assemble and bake

Layer the bottom of the dish with bread crumbs.
Add a layer of apples.
Repeat the layering of bread crumbs and apples.
Finish with a top layer of bread crumbs.
Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until apples are tender.

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.

Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Apple + breadtop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,790 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Apple + buttertop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,706 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together98,233 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Apple + sugartop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together16,478 recipes

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

Apple and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 16,478 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

Apples: Provide the fruit base that softens into the filling as it bakes.
Bread crumbs: Form the layers that hold the filling together and give the dish its structure.
Sugar: Sweetens the apples and helps draw out their juices as they cook.
Dripping: Greases the dish and adds richness and browning to the crumb layers.