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Dessert

Creamed Apple-tart

A tart of sliced apples baked with brown sugar, lemon peel, custard, and pastry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,551 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Creamed Apple-tart

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the tart

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Line a deep pie dish with pastry.

  3. Slice the apples.

  4. Fill the dish with sliced apples.

  5. Add brown sugar, lemon peel, lemon juice, and cold water.

  6. Cover with crust.

  7. Trim the crust.

  8. Notch the edges neatly.

Bake and finish

  1. Bake for 30 to 45 minutes, being careful not to brown too much.

  2. Once baked, cut out a round piece from the center of the top.

  3. Fill the opening with custard.

  4. Level the custard with the top.

  5. Grate a little nutmeg over the custard.

  6. Serve very cold.

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 + lemontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,551 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Apple + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together16,478 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

Apple and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 16,478 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

Apples
Provide the main body and bulk of the filling, softening as they bake.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the apples caramelise slightly in the juices.
Boiled custard
Forms a smooth, creamy filling that contrasts with the baked fruit and pastry.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the sweetness of the apples and sugar.
Puff paste or flaky pie crust
Forms a crisp, flaky shell that holds the filling and browns in the oven.

The step that matters

Bake for 30 to 45 minutes without over-browning. Apples must cook through while the pastry turns golden. Over-browning means the crust burns before the fruit softens. Checking colour and cutting back the heat if needed keeps the crust crisp and the filling tender.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Pearfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Apricotfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against apple, sugar. 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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