Name: Buttered Apples
Ingredients: 2 pounds quartered apples; ½ pound butter; ½ pound sugar; Toast for serving

Why it works: Apple and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,706 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Buttered Apples

Oven, in the book's wordsA cool oven

Ingredients

2 pounds quartered apples
½ pound butter
½ pound sugar
Toast for serving

Directions

The book says “a cool oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the apples

Melt the butter in a skillet.
Add the quartered apples and sprinkle with sugar.
Place in a low oven at 300°F (150°C) and roast slowly.

Serve

Serve the apples on toast with an additional sprinkle of sugar.

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 + buttertop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,706 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together98,233 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Apple + sugartop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together16,478 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Apple and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 16,478 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

Apples: Provide the fruit that softens and becomes tender as it roasts.
Butter: Adds fat and richness, helping the apples brown and carry flavor.
Sugar: Adds sweetness and helps the apples caramelize and brown in the oven.