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Dessert

Pumpkin Pie

A pie filled with pumpkin custard and topped with whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Pumpkin Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the filling

  1. Line a pie pan with the pie crust.

  2. In a bowl, mix the beaten eggs, milk, sugar, pumpkin, salt, nutmeg, cinnamon, ginger, and melted butter.

  3. Pour the mixture into the lined pie pan.

Bake and finish

  1. Bake using two radiators heated to 450°F (230°C) for 30 minutes.

  2. Once cooled, cover the pie with whipped cream seasoned with vanilla and sugar.

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. Nutmeg + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cinnamon + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Pumpkin + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,744 recipes

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

  4. Nutmeg + gingertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,324 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set the filling into a firm custard as they cook, giving the pie its structure.
Milk
Provides the liquid base of the custard and adds richness and softness.
Pumpkin
Supplies the main flavor, moisture, and body of the filling.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the spices and pumpkin flavor.

The step that matters

Bake the filling until just set. Egg proteins set as the custard heats, so the pie must be baked until the center is firm but not overcooked. Too much heat or time can make the custard curdle, weep, or crack.

Swap the pumpkin

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, milk, sugar, nutmeg, cinnamon, ginger, butter):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, milk, sugar, nutmeg, cinnamon, ginger, butter. 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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