Why it works: Apple and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,478 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓
Appleade, No. 1
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Wash and slice the apples without peeling or coring them.
Make the juice
In a saucepan, combine the apples and water, and boil covered until the apples break down.
Strain the mixture, pressing the apples hard in a cloth to extract the juice.
Strain the juice again through a fine bag and let it cool.
Sweeten and serve
Sweeten with white sugar and serve chilled.
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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Apple + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together16,478 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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
- Sour apples
- Provide the tart flavour and the pectin that gives the drink body.
- White sugar
- Sweetens the drink and balances the sourness of the apples.
The step that matters
Boiling until the apples break down. Apples must be cooked long enough for their cell walls to soften and release juice; under-cooked apples yield little juice and a cloudy, thin result.
“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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