Skip to main content
Dessert

Green Apple Pie. No. 1

A pie made with green apples, sugar, nutmeg, and a double crust, baked until cooked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Green Apple Pie. No. 1

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare

  1. Pare, core, and quarter the apples.

  2. Prepare a pie plate with a bottom crust.

Assemble

  1. Arrange the apples in the pie plate as level as possible.

  2. Grate a little nutmeg over the apples and add sugar to sweeten.

  3. Cover with a richer top crust.

Bake and finish

  1. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until the apples are cooked.

  2. If desired, brush the top with a little sweet cream for a golden brown color.

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 + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Apple + nutmegtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,790 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Nutmeg + creamtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,920 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

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

  5. Sugar + nutmegtop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together23,364 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

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

Green apples
Form the filling; they soften as they bake and give the pie its body.
Sugar
Sweetens the apples and helps draw out juice that forms the filling.
Pie crust
Forms the structure that holds the filling and browns in the oven.
Sweet cream
Brushed on top to encourage browning and a golden color.

The step that matters

Arranging the apples level. Apples that are unevenly stacked leave gaps and uneven pockets that can cook unevenly or sink, so a level arrangement helps the apples bake evenly and the crust sit flat.

Swap the apple

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, nutmeg, cream. 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.

You might also like

Apple PuddingApple Pudding256 recipesApple CakeApple Cake80 recipesApple MeringueApple Meringue75 recipesDried Apple CakeDried Apple Cake51 recipes