Name: Rice Snowball
Ingredients: 1 cup good rice; 6 large tart apples; cream; sugar; cocoanut sauce

Why it works: Cream and sugar 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 ↓

Rice Snowball

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Wash the rice and steam until half done.
Pare and core the apples without dividing them.
Place a clean square of cheesecloth over a plate and arrange the apples on it.

Cook and serve

Fill the apples and the spaces between with rice, then cover with the remaining rice.
Tie up the cloth and cook in boiling water until the apples are tender.
Lift from the water, drain well, untie the cloth, and invert the pudding onto a plate.
Serve hot with cream, sugar, or coconut sauce.

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.

Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together43,450 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Cream + saucetop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,787 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Rice + appletop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,311 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Sugar + saucetop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,147 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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

Rice: Forms the outer pudding body and absorbs flavour as it cooks, holding the shape around the apples.
Tart apples: Provide the fruit core and acidity that contrasts with the soft, mild rice.