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Dessert

Apple or Pineapple Scones

A quick baked scone with apple or pineapple, made from flour, butter, sugar, egg, baking soda, and cream of tartar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Apple or Pineapple Scones

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the dough

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, mix the flour, baking soda, and cream of tartar.

  3. In another bowl, cream the butter and sugar, then add the egg.

  4. Combine the wet and dry ingredients, adding milk to form a nice dough.

  5. Roll the dough and divide it in two.

Fill and bake

  1. Sprinkle the minced apple with sugar and cinnamon, or the pineapple with sugar only.

  2. Place the fruit between the sheets of dough.

  3. Cut into desired shapes and bake in the preheated oven.

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.

  1. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  4. Apple + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,104 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  5. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

All-purpose flour
Provides the main structure that holds the scones together.
Baking soda
Reacts with the cream of tartar to produce gas that lightens the scones.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the mixture so it reacts with baking soda to help the scones rise.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and richness in the crumb.
Egg
Binds the dough and adds richness and structure.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps brown the scone surface.

The step that matters

Combine the wet and dry ingredients, adding milk. Overmixing develops gluten and makes scones tough, while too little milk leaves a dry dough. Mix just until the dough comes together, adding milk gradually.

Swap the apple

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Coconutfits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, flour, cream, butter, sugar, milk. 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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