Why it works: Sugar and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 92,116 recipes. Both carry phenylacetaldehyde, which smells hawthorne, honey. The science ↓
Peach Pie
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the filling
Cut the peeled peaches and spread them in the pie dish like apples.
Sprinkle the peaches with sugar and a little flour.
If the peaches are very juicy, do not add water.
Assemble and bake
Cover with the second pie crust and bake.
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.
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Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Peach + sugartop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,308 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Peach + flourtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together787 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Peaches
- Provide the fruit and most of the juice that forms the filling as it bakes.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and draws juice out of the peaches as they sit.
- Flour
- Thickens the peach juices as they heat so the filling holds together when cut.
- Pie crusts
- Form the structure that encloses the filling while it bakes.
The step that matters
Skip added water with juicy peaches. Peaches release their own juice when heated. Extra water thins the filling, and a small amount of flour can only thicken so much, so the pie may run when sliced.
Swap the peach
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, flour):
- Raisinfits better
- Vanillafits better
- Blueberryfits better
- Peachthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, flour. 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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