Why it works: Apple and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,598 recipes. Both carry methyl cinnamate, which smells strawberry. The science ↓
Brown Betty
Ingredients
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.
Assemble the dish
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
In a greased pan, layer 1 inch of chopped apples.
Sprinkle with sugar and spice.
Add a layer of fine bread crumbs.
Repeat layers of apples, sugar, spice, and bread crumbs.
Top with butter the size of an egg.
Pour water over the entire dish.
Bake
Bake for 2 hours.
Make the sauce
For the sauce, mix 1 cup sugar with ½ cup butter.
Beat 1 egg lightly with preferred spice.
Add a little boiling water and hold over boiling water, beating until hot.
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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Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,598 recipes
Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).
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Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together30,779 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together22,662 recipes
Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
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Apple + breadtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,790 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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
- Form the bulk of the dessert and soften into a moist, tender filling as they bake.
- Bread crumbs
- Absorb the apple juices and butter, holding the layers together with a soft texture.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the apples caramelize and deepen in flavour as they bake.
- Butter
- Adds richness and fat, helping the top brown and the crumbs turn golden.
- Egg
- In the sauce, the beaten egg thickens gently with heat and adds richness.
The step that matters
Heating the egg for the sauce. Heat the egg slowly over boiling water while beating. Its proteins set gently and thicken the sauce; too much heat too fast makes them curdle and scramble.
Swap the apple
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, cinnamon, bread, egg, butter):
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits about as well
- Raisinfits about as well
- Applethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cinnamon, bread, egg, 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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