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Dessert

Apple Fritters

Fried apple slices coated in a light batter, served sprinkled with white sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and brandy are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,291 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Apple Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Beat the yolks of the eggs and mix with the flour to form a batter.

  2. Beat the egg whites until stiff and gently fold them into the batter.

Prepare the apples

  1. Combine the apple slices with brandy and sugar; let them soak for 3 hours.

Fry and serve

  1. Dip each apple slice into the batter, ensuring they are well coated.

  2. Heat lard in a frying pan and fry the battered apple slices until golden brown.

  3. Remove from the pan and sprinkle with white sugar before serving.

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 + brandytop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,291 recipes

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

  2. Wheat + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,373 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Wheat + appletop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together205 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, fruity).

  4. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Eggs
Yolks bind the batter, and whipped whites add lightness and help it puff when fried.
Wheat flour
Forms the batter that coats the apple slices and sets into a crisp shell when fried.
Apples
The main filling, becoming tender and sweet-tasting as they cook inside the batter.
Brandy
Soaks into the apples, adding aroma and flavour.
Lard
Frying fat that browns the batter and gives it a rich, crisp surface.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Whites beaten until stiff hold air that gives the batter lift. Folding gently keeps that air in; stirring hard deflates the foam and leaves the fritters dense.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, wheat, flour, sugar, brandy):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, wheat, flour, sugar, brandy. 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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