Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓
Peach Pie
Ingredients
Directions
Pare, stone, and slice the peaches.
Line a deep pie plate with the pie crust.
Sprinkle a little cornstarch over the bottom crust.
Lay the sliced peaches in the crust and sprinkle sugar over them based on their sweetness.
Add a few pounded peach kernels to the pie.
Bake with crossbars of crust on top.
For meringue, whip the egg whites to stiff peaks, then sweeten with powdered sugar and add cream of tartar.
Spread the meringue over the pie and return to the oven until set.
Serve cold.
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.
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Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Peach + sugartop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,308 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Egg + creamtop 24% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together42,166 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
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Peach + creamtop 25% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together721 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Egg and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 42,166 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
Swap the peach
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, egg, cream):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Strawberryfits better
- Peachthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, cream. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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