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Dessert

Apple Meringue Pudding

A baked apple dessert topped with meringue.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Apple Meringue Pudding

Ingredients

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.

Make the base

  1. In a bowl, mix the stewed apples, eggs, white sugar, butter, nutmeg, and cinnamon.

  2. While the apples are still very hot, stir in the butter and then the egg yolks one at a time until light.

  3. Pour the mixture into a buttered dish and bake at 400°F (200°C) for 10 minutes.

Top and brown

  1. Prepare the meringue by beating the egg whites with 2 tablespoons of sugar and bitter almond flavoring.

  2. Cover the pudding with the meringue without removing it from the oven and brown slightly.

Serve

  1. Serve cold with cream.

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. Nutmeg + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cinnamon + almondtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,514 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Nutmeg + almondtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,115 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,598 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  5. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Eggs
Set the custard and add richness, and their whites form the meringue foam.
Stewed apples
Provide moisture, body and the main fruit flavor of the pudding.
White sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the meringue foam stay stable and brown.
Butter
Adds fat for a softer, richer texture in the baked base.

The step that matters

Browning the meringue. Sugar in the meringue browns quickly, so it can scorch before it colors evenly. Beaten egg whites hold a stable foam, and a brief, watched bake sets and lightly browns the top without deflating it.

Swap the apple

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

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

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