Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
Apple Pudding
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 apples
Stew the apples in a little water until tender.
Mash the cooked apples finely while hot.
Mix in the butter, sugar, and spices.
Let the mixture cool, then add the beaten eggs.
Bake and serve
Butter a large pudding dish and sprinkle the bottom with bread crumbs.
Bake at 350°F (175°C) or steam until done.
Sift sugar over the pudding before serving.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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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Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together22,662 recipes
Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
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Apple + breadtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,790 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Apple + buttertop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,706 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Apples
- Provide the bulk and fruity flavour, and their pectin helps the pudding set soft.
- Eggs
- Bind the mixture and set it into a custard-like texture as it cooks.
- Butter
- Adds richness and fat, giving a softer, more tender crumb.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps browning on the surface during baking.
The step that matters
Add the eggs after the mixture cools. If the apple mixture is still very hot when the beaten eggs go in, the eggs can scramble or curdle instead of blending smoothly and setting evenly into the pudding.
Swap the apple
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, egg, bread):
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits better
- Datesfits about as well
- Applethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, bread. 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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