Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Cherry Pie
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
Make the filling
In a bowl, combine the cherries, sugar, and flour.
Fill a pie dish with the cherry mixture.
Dot the filling with butter to taste.
Assemble and bake
Moisten the edges of the pie crust with water and cover with a top crust.
Bake for 30 to 40 minutes, reducing the heat after 12 to 15 minutes.
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.
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together98,233 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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 cherries
- Provide the main fruit, tartness and bulk of the filling.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the filling and balances the sourness of the cherries.
- Flour
- Thickens the cherry juices so the filling sets rather than running out.
- Butter
- Adds richness and fat to the filling, contributing to flavor and mouthfeel.
The step that matters
Thickening the filling with flour. Flour must be evenly mixed with the sugar and cherries so it can absorb the released juices as the pie bakes. Uneven mixing leaves pockets of raw starch and a runny or pasty filling.
“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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