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Rhubarb Pie

A fruit pie made with rhubarb, sugar, lemon, flour, and a crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Rhubarb Pie

Why it works: Rhubarb and flour match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 670 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Rhubarb Pie

Ingredients

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.

Assemble

  1. Line a pie plate with the crust.

  2. Fill with the rhubarb pieces.

  3. Sprinkle with sugar and lemon juice.

  4. Thickly sprinkle flour over the filling.

  5. Cover with the upper crust.

Bake and finish

  1. Bake gently at 400°F (200°C) until done.

  2. Remove from oven and brush the crust with egg white.

  3. Sprinkle with granulated sugar.

  4. Let cool before slicing and serve fresh.

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.

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.

  1. Rhubarb + flourtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together670 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Rhubarb + lemontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together546 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  3. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + lemontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Rhubarb stalks
Provides the tart flavor and bulk of the filling, releasing juices as it bakes.
Sugar
Sweetens the tart rhubarb and helps draw out juice that thickens into the filling.
Flour
Thickens the juices released by the rhubarb so the filling sets when cooled.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rhubarb's flavor and balances the sweetness.
Egg white
Brushed on the crust to promote browning and a glossy finish.

The step that matters

Let cool before slicing. Rhubarb filling thickens as it cools because the starch from the flour gels in the released juices. Cutting too early lets the hot, loose filling run out.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rhubarb, sugar, flour, egg):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rhubarb, sugar, flour, egg. 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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