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Dessert

Apple Pudding

A baked apple pudding made with sliced apples, bread crumbs, butter, sugar, and cinnamon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Apple Pudding

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 ↓

Apple Pudding

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.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Butter a pudding dish well.

Layer and bake

  1. Layer bread crumbs in the dish, then add dots of butter.

  2. Add a layer of sliced apples sprinkled with sugar and cinnamon.

  3. Repeat the layers until the dish is full, finishing with bread crumbs on top.

  4. Cover and bake for 30 to 40 minutes, depending on the size of the dish.

Serve

  1. Turn out the pudding, pour liquid sauce over it, and serve hot.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Apple + breadtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,790 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Apple + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,706 recipes

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

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

Tart apples
Provide the fruit flavour and moisture that softens during baking.
Bread crumbs
Form the bulk of the pudding and soak up the juices as it bakes.
Butter
Adds richness and helps the top and dish surfaces brown lightly.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the apples caramelise slightly in the oven.
Cinnamon
Adds warm aroma that complements the apples.

The step that matters

Cover and bake for 30 to 40 minutes. Covering traps steam so the apples cook through and the crumbs stay moist; uncovered, the top can dry out. Baking time depends on dish size, so check that the apples are tender and the centre is set.

Swap the apple

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits about as well
  3. Raisinfits about as well
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, butter, sugar, 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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