Why it works: Apple and white wine match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and 357 recipes mention both. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓
The recipe
Ingredients
Contains: egg, milk, wheat, tree nuts (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
Line a dish with puff pastry.
Layer the apple pieces in the dish. Sprinkle with sugar, cinnamon, mace, nutmeg, cloves, and lemon peel.
Repeat layers until the dish is full.
Pour the white wine over the apples.
Cover the dish with puff pastry.
Bake and serve
Bake until golden.
Remove the crust.
Mix the butter and beaten eggs with the apples.
Replace the crust.
Serve hot or cold.
Optionally add pounded almonds and a little lemon juice.
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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.
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Apple + white winetop 3% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together357 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
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Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together11,917 recipes
Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
-
Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together14,027 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
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Mace + nutmegtop 1% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together6,557 recipes
Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
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Nutmeg + clovetop 1% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together8,368 recipes
Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Baking apples
- Provide the bulk of the filling and soften into tender pieces as they bake.
- Eggs
- Bind the filling and help it set into a custard-like texture when baked.
- Butter
- Adds richness and a silky mouthfeel to the apple filling.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the apples brown and caramelise slightly.
- White wine
- Adds moisture and acidity that flavours the apples as they cook.
- Puff pastry
- Forms the flaky crust that encloses the filling and browns to golden.
The step that matters
Mix the butter and beaten eggs with the apples. Eggs can scramble or curdle if added to hot fruit unevenly. Stirring them in thoroughly so they distribute through the apples lets the eggs set evenly as the tart bakes.
Flavor stand-ins for the lemon
The recipe marks lemon as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (apple, sugar, cinnamon, mace, nutmeg, clove, white wine):
- Figbetter flavor fit
- Orangebetter flavor fit
- Pearbetter flavor fit
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against apple, sugar, cinnamon, mace, nutmeg, clove, white wine. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).
“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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