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Dessert

Apple and Other Pies

A pie made with fine juicy acid apples, brown sugar, lemon rind, lemon juice, and pie crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 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 ↓

Apple and Other Pies

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.

Prepare

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

  2. Pare, core, and cut the apples into small pieces.

  3. Line a deep dish with pie crust.

Assemble and bake

  1. Fill the dish with apples, layering in brown sugar, lemon rind, and lemon juice.

  2. Cover with another sheet of pie crust, seal the edges, and notch them.

  3. Bake for about 45 minutes.

Serve

  1. Serve with cream and sugar or cold boiled custard.

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 bulk of the filling, and their acidity and pectin help the filling set as it cooks.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and moisture, and its molasses flavour deepens the taste of the filling.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the apple flavour and helps keep the fruit from tasting flat.
Lemon rind
Contributes aromatic oils that add fresh citrus fragrance to the filling.
Pie crust
Forms the structure that holds the filling and browns in the oven.

The step that matters

Seal and notch the top crust. A tight seal keeps juices from leaking out and boiling over, and notches let steam escape so the crust does not turn soggy or burst while the apples soften.

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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