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Dessert

Pumpkin Pie

A pie made with stewed pumpkin, milk, eggs, sugar, spices, baked in a pie tin.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Ginger and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,380 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Pumpkin Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the pumpkin

  1. Cut the pumpkin into long strips.

  2. Remove the pulp and seeds from the pumpkin.

  3. Pare the strips.

  4. Cut the strips into small pieces.

  5. Place the pumpkin pieces in a kettle with a little water.

  6. Cover the kettle tightly.

  7. Stew the pumpkin slowly for at least 6 hours.

  8. Stir the pumpkin frequently while stewing.

  9. If the pumpkin is watery, set the kettle on a hot part of the stove.

  10. Stir the pumpkin constantly until it dries.

  11. Lift the pumpkin into a colander.

  12. Pulp the pumpkin through the colander.

Make the filling

  1. Beat the eggs lightly.

  2. Add the beaten eggs to the pumpkin.

  3. Stir until the mixture becomes creamy.

  4. Add the coarse sea salt, sugar, cinnamon, and ginger to the mixture.

  5. Stir the mixture thoroughly.

  6. Gradually add the milk to the mixture.

  7. Taste and adjust the sugar and spice as needed.

Bake the pies

  1. Line three pie tins.

  2. Divide the filling among the lined tins while stirring.

  3. Bake the pies for 30 minutes at 400°F (200°C).

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. Ginger + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Pumpkin + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,744 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Pumpkin + gingertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,158 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Cinnamon + sugartop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Cinnamon and sugar 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

Stewed pumpkin
Forms the body of the filling and provides most of its texture.
Eggs
Set when baked, giving the filling structure and a firm, sliceable custard.
Milk
Adds moisture and creaminess, loosening the filling and softening its set.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the earthy flavor of the pumpkin.
Ginger
Adds warm, pungent aroma that defines the spiced flavor.
Cinnamon
Adds sweet, woody aroma that rounds out the spice blend.

The step that matters

Drying the stewed pumpkin. Stewing and stirring evaporate excess water from the pumpkin. Extra moisture would thin the filling and keep the custard from setting firmly in the oven, leaving a watery pie.

Swap the ginger

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pumpkin, milk, egg, cinnamon, sugar):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Gingerthe original
  4. Clovefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against pumpkin, milk, egg, cinnamon, sugar. 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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