Skip to main content
Dessert

Proportions for Eight Persons

Fried pineapple fritters coated in powdered sugar, served with a sweet cream mixture and filbert topping.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 18 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Pineapple and vanilla match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and 911 recipes mention both. Both carry ethyl isobutyrate, which smells fruity, ethereal. The science ↓

The recipe

Ingredients

Contains: egg, milk, wheat, tree nuts (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak pineapple slices in a mixture of 2 tablespoons powdered sugar and 4 to 6 tablespoons kirsch or brandy.

  2. Combine 2 ½ oz all-purpose flour, 2 ½ oz powdered sugar, 1 whole egg, 3 egg yolks, 2 ½ cups milk, and the vanilla bean in a bowl, and mix well.

  3. Melt 1 oz butter and add it to the mixture.

  4. Mix 1 oz powdered sugar with 1 oz shelled filberts in another bowl.

Make the batter

  1. Combine 6 oz all-purpose flour, 2 tablespoons melted butter, 1 egg, a pinch of salt, a pinch of sugar, and ¾ cup water for the batter, and mix until smooth.

Fry and finish

  1. Fry the fritters.

  2. Coat the fritters with very fine powdered sugar.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Pineapple + vanillatop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together911 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

  2. Milk + vanillatop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together19,175 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  3. Sugar + vanillatop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together35,031 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Brandy + vanillatop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Pineapple + brandytop 5% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together298 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

Sugar and vanilla share little aroma chemistry, yet 35,031 recipes mention both: they likely 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

All-purpose flour
Forms the structure of the cream and the batter as it sets when cooked.
Eggs
Add structure and richness, and help the cream and batter set and bind.
Milk
Provides the liquid that turns the cream mixture smooth and pourable.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and tenderness in the cream and batter.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the cream and soaking mixture and gives a fine coating on the finished fritters.
Kirsch or brandy
Adds aroma and flavor to the pineapple slices during soaking.

The step that matters

Mix the batter until smooth. Lumps of flour left in the batter can stay dry inside the fritter. Mixing until smooth hydrates the flour evenly so the batter fries to a uniform, tender texture.

Flavor stand-ins for the pineapple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, brandy, flour, cream, egg, milk, vanilla):

  1. Strawberrybetter flavor fit
  2. Figbetter flavor fit
  3. Raspberryabout as good a flavor fit
  4. Pineapplethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, brandy, flour, cream, egg, milk, vanilla. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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.

You might also like

Illustration of Pineapple SherbetIllustrationPineapple Sherbet116 recipesIllustration of Vanilla Ice CreamIllustrationVanilla Ice Cream108 recipesIllustration of Pineapple PuddingIllustrationPineapple Pudding72 recipesIllustration of Brandy PeachesIllustrationBrandy Peaches68 recipes