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Dessert

Crumb Pie

A sweet pie with a crumbly topping made from molasses, flour, sugar, butter, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Molasses and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,225 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Crumb Pie

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. In a bowl, rub together the flour, brown sugar, and butter until crumbly.

  3. Dissolve the baking soda in warm water and mix it with the molasses.

  4. Add ⅓ of the crumb mixture to the molasses mixture and stir well.

Assemble and bake

  1. Pour the mixture into pie dishes lined with crust.

  2. Sprinkle the remaining crumb mixture on top.

  3. Bake until golden brown.

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. Molasses + sugartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Molasses + flourtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,429 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Molasses
Provides the dark color, rich flavor, and moisture of the filling.
Flour
Forms the structure of the crumb topping and helps it hold its crumbly texture.
Butter
Adds fat that makes the crumb topping tender and helps it brown.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic molasses to lighten the filling and promote browning.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and moisture, and helps the topping brown.

The step that matters

Add ⅓ of the crumb mixture to the molasses mixture and stir well.. Baking soda must be fully dissolved and evenly mixed into the acidic molasses so the filling rises and sets evenly rather than in patches.

“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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