Name: Green Apple Pie
Ingredients: sliced sour apples; butter; sugar; cinnamon

Why it works: Apple and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,598 recipes. Both carry methyl cinnamate, which smells strawberry. The science ↓

Green Apple Pie

Ingredients

sliced sour apples
butter
sugar
cinnamon

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).

Assemble and bake

Place the sliced sour apples in a pie crust.
Dot the apples with butter, then sprinkle with sugar and cinnamon.
Cover with a top crust and 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.

Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,598 recipes

Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).
Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together30,779 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Apple + buttertop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,706 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Butter + cinnamontop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together17,784 recipes

Shared aroma: anethole (sweet, anise).
Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together98,233 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

Sliced sour apples: Provide the main filling, and their tartness balances the sweetness of the sugar.
Butter: Adds richness and fat, helping the filling and crust taste fuller and browner.
Sugar: Adds sweetness and helps the apples caramelize slightly as they bake.
Cinnamon: Adds warm aroma that complements the apples.