Name: Baked Apples and Rice Croquettes
Ingredients: 4 fine apples; 1 cup water; 2 ounces lemon juice; nutmeg to taste; rice croquettes; bits of jam

Why it works: Lemon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,318 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Baked Apples and Rice Croquettes

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

Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Pare and core the apples.

Cook and bake

In a saucepan, combine the apples, water, lemon juice, and nutmeg.
Cook for 30 minutes, then strain the mixture.
Return the apples to the saucepan and bake for 30 minutes.

Serve

Serve the baked apples on a dish with alternating rice croquettes and bits of jam.

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.

Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together11,318 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Nutmeg + ricetop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,779 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Lemon + ricetop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,366 recipes

Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).
Apple + nutmegtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,790 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Apple + ricetop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,311 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Apples: Provide the main body and tender texture once cooked and baked.
Lemon juice: Adds acidity that brightens the apple flavour and helps keep the fruit from browning.