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Dessert

Apple Snowball

A dessert of boiled apples in milk with rice, served hot with cream sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and clove are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,774 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Apple Snowball

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the rice

  1. Boil the rice in milk until nearly cooked.

Prepare the apples

  1. Peel and core the apples without dividing them.

  2. Place a clove and some sugar in the center of each apple.

  3. Tie each apple in a piece of cloth carefully.

Cook and serve

  1. Boil the wrapped apples for 45 minutes.

  2. Remove the cloth and serve hot with cream sauce.

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 + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,774 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Cream + saucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Milk + appletop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,104 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

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

What each ingredient does

Rice
Forms the starchy base that thickens the milk and gives the snowball its body.
Milk
Cooks the rice into a soft, creamy mass and adds moisture and richness.
Apples
Provide the fruit centre that softens and becomes tender during boiling.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the apple centre caramelise slightly as it cooks.

The step that matters

Tying the apples in cloth. A cloth that is tied too loosely can let water in and the filling leak out, while one tied too tightly can split the apple skin as it swells. Snug, even wrapping keeps the apple whole and its sugar filling contained during the long boil.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, milk, apple, sugar, cream, sauce):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Gingerfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, milk, apple, sugar, cream, sauce. 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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