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Dessert

Apple Pot Pie

Apple Pot Pie is a baked apple dessert with a pastry crust and a thickened apple filling.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Apple Pot Pie

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.

Make the pastry

  1. Rub 1 heaping tablespoon of lard into 1 pint of flour and ¼ teaspoon of coarse sea salt in a bowl until small globules form.

  2. Add cold water gradually and press the mixture together until it holds, without kneading.

Prepare the filling

  1. In a baking pan, combine the quartered apples, 1 large cup of sugar, 1 tablespoon of spices, 2 tablespoons of molasses, and 1 tablespoon of butter.

  2. Add enough water to nearly cover the apples and bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven until the apples soften.

  3. Dredge a little flour into the mixture to thicken the juice.

Assemble and bake

  1. Roll out the pastry and cut a cover to fit the pan, using trimmings to make dumplings.

  2. Fold the pie cover in half, make several slits for steam, and place it on top of the apples.

  3. Bake until the crust is lightly browned and serve warm, optionally with 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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  3. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  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

All-purpose flour
Forms the gluten structure of the pastry that holds the crust together.
Lard
Coats flour particles to create a short, tender, flaky pastry texture.
Apples
Provide the bulk of the filling and soften as they bake into a tender fruit layer.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the juices thicken and caramelize as the filling bakes.
Molasses
Adds deep sweetness, dark color, and a rich caramel-like flavor to the filling.
Butter
Adds richness and fat to the filling, contributing flavor and a glossy texture.

The step that matters

Thickening the juice with flour. Flour must be dredged into the apple juices before the crust goes on so starch can thicken the liquid. Without this, the filling stays runny and can soak the pastry from below.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, molasses, butter):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, molasses, 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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