Why it works: Apple and cinnamon 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 ↓
Baked Apples
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Wash and core the apples.
If apples are thick-skinned, peel them after coring.
Place them in an earthen or enameled baking dish.
Add 1 tablespoon of brown sugar into each cavity.
If lacking flavor, mix 1 teaspoon lemon juice and ¼ teaspoon cinnamon with ¼ cup sugar and add to the apples.
Bake and serve
Pour boiling water into the dish, using ½ cup for every 8 apples.
Bake until soft, basting the apples with the syrup that forms in the pan.
Serve cold with cream or milk.
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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Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,598 recipes
Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).
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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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Apple + lemontop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,551 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Apple + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together16,478 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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 main body that softens and turns tender during baking.
- Brown sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps form the syrup that bastes the apples in the pan.
- Boiling water
- Creates steam and a moist baking liquid that softens the apples and forms the syrup.
The step that matters
Bake until soft, basting with the syrup. Apples are done when the flesh is soft throughout, not just when the skin looks cooked. Regular basting moistens the surface and keeps the flesh from drying as the syrup forms in the pan.
Swap the lemon
The recipe marks lemon as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (apple, sugar, cinnamon):
- Vanillafits better
- Pearfits better
- Quincefits better
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against apple, sugar, cinnamon. 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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