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Dessert

Cocoa Nut Pie

A coconut pie made with grated coconut, sugar, butter, egg whites, wine, rose water, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Coconut and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 411 recipes. Both carry beta-pinene, which smells pine, resin. The science ↓

Cocoa Nut Pie

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

  1. Cream the butter and powdered sugar until well mixed.

  2. Beat in the white wine and rose water until light.

  3. Gently fold in the grated coconut with minimal beating.

  4. Whip the egg whites until stiff and fold them in with a few skillful strokes.

Bake and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into pie shells and bake immediately.

  2. Serve cold, dusted with powdered 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. Coconut + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together411 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-pinene (pine, resin).

  2. Butter + white winetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,083 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Coconut + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,467 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Rose + nutmegtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Butter + nutmegtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together24,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg whites
Whipped to stiff peaks, they trap air and give the filling a light, airy lift.
Butter
Creamed with sugar, it adds richness and helps the filling hold a smooth, tender texture.
Powdered white sugar
Dissolves easily into the creamed butter and adds sweetness and a fine, tender crumb.
Grated coconut
Adds chewy texture and coconut flavor to the filling.
White wine
Adds acidity and liquid that lightens the creamed butter and sugar mixture.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Stiff whipped whites hold the air that lightens the filling. Overmixing deflates them, so fold gently with a few strokes and bake right after combining.

Swap the coconut

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, egg, white wine, rose, nutmeg):

  1. Lemonfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Coconutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, egg, white wine, rose, nutmeg. 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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