Why it works: Cinnamon and apple are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,598 recipes. Both carry methyl cinnamate, which smells strawberry. The science ↓
Apple Sauce
Ingredients
Directions
Make the syrup
Combine water, sugar, lemon slices, and cinnamon in a porcelain saucepan.
Bring to a boil for 5 minutes.
Cook the apples
Add the quartered apples to the syrup and stew gently until tender and clear, without stirring.
Carefully remove the apples with a skimmer.
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.
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Cinnamon + appletop 4% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,598 recipes
Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).
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Sugar + syruptop 6% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together5,842 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Lemon + cinnamontop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together7,950 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
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Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together30,779 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Cinnamon + syruptop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together990 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Sugar and cinnamon 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
- Apples
- Provide the fruit that softens and turns clear as it stews in the syrup.
- White sugar
- Sweetens the syrup and helps the apples hold their shape while cooking.
- Lemon
- Adds acidity that brightens the flavour of the syrup and apples.
The step that matters
Stew gently without stirring. Boiling hard or stirring breaks the apple pieces apart and clouds the syrup. Gentle heat lets the fruit soften while keeping its pieces whole and the syrup clear.
“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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