Skip to main content
Dessert

Apple Snow

Apple Snow is a dessert made from grated apple, powdered sugar, egg white, and custard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Apple and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,478 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Apple Snow

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Peel and grate the apple into a large dish.

  2. Sprinkle the grated apple with powdered sugar to prevent browning.

Make the snow and serve

  1. Add the egg white and beat constantly for 30 minutes until light and stiff.

  2. Heap the mixture in a large dish and pour smooth custard around it.

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. Apple + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together16,478 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Apple + eggtop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,461 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

Sour apple
Provides the tart flavour and the bulk of the fluffy base.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the dish and, sprinkled on the grated apple, helps prevent browning.
Egg white
Beaten until stiff, it traps air and gives the snow its light, airy structure.
Custard
Made from the yolk, it adds richness and a smooth, creamy contrast to the snow.

The step that matters

Beating the egg white until light and stiff. Egg white must be beaten long enough to form a stable foam that holds air. Under-beaten whites collapse and the snow turns watery and dense.

Swap the apple

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Lemonfits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg. 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.

More apple snow recipes

You might also like