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Dessert

Apples Stewed in Butter

Apples stewed in butter with sugar, lemon, currant jelly, and Madeira or sherry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and sherry work together. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 395 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

Apples Stewed in Butter

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the apples

  1. Peel, core, and slice the apples into ¼‑inch thick slices.

  2. Melt the butter in a skillet over medium heat.

Stew the apples

  1. Add the apple slices, sugar, and lemon juice to the skillet.

  2. Stew gently until the apples are tender.

Finish and serve

  1. Arrange the apples on a serving dish.

  2. Melt the currant jelly in the skillet, then mix in the Madeira or sherry.

  3. Pour the jelly mixture over the apples and serve.

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 + sherrytop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together395 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  2. Currant + sherrytop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together393 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Apple + curranttop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,918 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  4. Butter + sherrytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,505 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

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

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Tart cooking apples
Provide the fruit that softens during stewing while holding some shape and tartness.
Butter
Adds fat and richness to the pan, carrying flavor and helping the apples brown lightly.
Granulated sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the apples caramelize in the pan juices.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the apples and balances the sweetness.
Currant jelly
Melts into a glossy, sweet-tart glaze that coats the apples.
Madeira or sherry
Adds fortified-wine depth and aroma to the glaze.

The step that matters

Stew gently until the apples are tender. Gentle heat softens the apple flesh evenly without breaking the slices apart. Too high a heat scorches the butter and sugar before the apples cook through.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Figfits better
  2. Plumfits better
  3. Pearfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against apple, butter, sugar, currant, sherry. 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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