Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓
Apple Cream
Ingredients
Directions
Make the apple base
Stew the apples until tender and mash them to a pulp.
Whisk and combine
Whisk the egg whites until very light.
Once the apples are cold, add them to the whisked egg whites along with the sugar.
Whisk the mixture until it holds its shape when placed on a dish.
Serve
Serve with sweetened cream flavored with lemon, vanilla, or wine.
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.
-
Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
-
Apple + lemontop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,551 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
-
Apple + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together16,478 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
-
Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together53,532 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
-
Egg + lemontop 19% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together44,316 recipes
Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).
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 base and flavor, softened into a pulp that gives body to the cream.
- Egg whites
- Whipped to foam, they give the dish its light, airy structure.
- Loaf sugar
- Sweetens the mixture and helps stabilize the whipped egg white foam.
The step that matters
Whisking the mixture to shape. The apples must be cold before they are folded into the whisked egg whites. Warm fruit can deflate the foam and make the mixture slack, so it may not hold its shape.
Swap the apple
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, sugar, cream, lemon):
- Vanillafits better
- Raspberryfits better
- Orangefits better
- Applethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, cream, lemon. 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.
More apple cream recipes
You might also like
The free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.
Apple Pudding256 recipes
Lemon Cake228 recipes
Lemon Ice147 recipes
Lemon Sherbet103 recipes