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Dessert

Dutch Apple Cake

A yeasted apple cake with butter, sugar, cinnamon, and currants, baked in a pan.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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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 ↓

Dutch Apple Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the dough

  1. Mix the milk, butter, sugar, and salt in a bowl.

  2. When lukewarm, add the yeast cake and unbeaten eggs, then add enough flour to make a soft dough.

  3. Cover the dough and let it rise until doubled in size.

  4. Beat the dough thoroughly and let it rise again.

Assemble and bake

  1. Spread the dough thinly in a buttered baking pan and brush with melted butter.

  2. Pare and core the apples, then cut them into eighths.

  3. Press the apple pieces into the dough in parallel rows.

  4. Sprinkle the apples with the sugar mixed with cinnamon and currants.

  5. Cover and let rise again, then bake at 350°F (175°C) for 30 minutes.

  6. Cut into squares and serve hot or cold with sweetened whipped cream.

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 + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,598 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Flour
Forms the dough structure that holds the rise and supports the apples.
Yeast cake
Produces gas as it ferments, making the dough rise and become light.
Eggs
Add richness and help bind the dough and give it structure.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and flavor in the dough and the pan.
Sour apples
Provide tart flavor and moisture that contrasts with the sweet topping.

The step that matters

Let the dough rise until doubled. Yeast needs time and warmth to produce enough gas for the dough to become light. Rising too briefly leaves a dense cake, so the dough should fully double before shaping and again before baking.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, butter, sugar, egg, flour, apple, cinnamon):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, butter, sugar, egg, flour, apple, cinnamon. 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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