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Apple or Peach Meringue Pie

A fruit pie topped with a fluffy meringue.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,790 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Apple or Peach Meringue 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 the filling

  1. Peeled, sliced, and stewed the fruit until soft.

  2. Sweetened and mashed the fruit, then added grated nutmeg.

  3. Spread the fruit mixture into the pie crust and baked at 350°F (175°C) until done.

Make and bake the meringue

  1. In a bowl, whipped the egg whites until frothy.

  2. Gradually added 3 tablespoons of sugar and beat until stiff peaks formed.

  3. Spread the meringue on the pie, about ¾ inch thick.

  4. Returned the pie to the oven until the meringue was set.

  5. Served cold.

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 + nutmegtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,790 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Nutmeg + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together24,744 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  3. Apple + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together16,478 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Sugar + nutmegtop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together23,364 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

  5. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Nutmeg and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 24,744 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

Fruit (apples or peaches)
Forms the soft, sweet filling that bakes inside the crust.
Sugar
Sweetens the fruit and helps stabilise the whipped egg white meringue.
Egg whites
Whip into a foam that sets when heated, forming the meringue topping.
Cornstarch
Thickens the fruit juices so the filling holds its shape when sliced.

The step that matters

Beating the egg whites to stiff peaks. Egg whites must be beaten until stiff peaks form, because the air trapped in the foam gives the meringue its volume. Adding sugar gradually helps keep the foam stable so it does not weep or collapse in the oven.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, nutmeg, egg):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Lemonfits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, nutmeg, egg. 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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