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Dessert

Apples with Rice, Vanilla, and Macaroons

A baked rice pudding with apples, apricots, vanilla, and macaroons.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Vanilla and apricot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 608 recipes. Both carry 4-methoxybenzaldehyde, which smells sweet, anise. The science ↓

Apples with Rice, Vanilla, and Macaroons

Ingredients

Directions

Make the rice

  1. Simmer the rice in water for 1 hour, stirring occasionally.

  2. Add the egg yolks to the rice to thicken it.

Prepare the apples

  1. Core and turn the apples.

  2. Boil the apples in a syrup made with sugar.

Assemble and serve

  1. Butter a domed mold.

  2. Line the mold with ¾ of the rice.

  3. Fill the apples with apricots and place them inside the mold.

  4. Cover the mold with the remaining rice.

  5. Turn the mold onto a dish.

  6. Mask the surface with reduced syrup.

  7. Sprinkle the surface with crushed macaroons.

  8. Serve hot.

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. Vanilla + apricottop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together608 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-methoxybenzaldehyde (sweet, anise).

  2. Apple + apricottop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together777 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-undecalactone (peach, sweet).

  3. Apple + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,501 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  5. Rice + vanillatop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,352 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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 bulk of the pudding and sets into a firm, tender structure once cooked.
Egg yolks
Thicken the rice mixture and add richness as they set with heat.
Apples
Hold their shape when boiled in syrup, giving the pudding a soft, fruity centre.
Sugar
Sweetens the apples and forms the syrup that coats them.
Sweet macaroons
Crushed on top, they add a crisp, sweet contrast to the soft pudding.

The step that matters

Thickening the rice with egg yolks. Egg yolks set when heated, so they thicken the rice, but if the mixture gets too hot it can curdle or turn grainy. Add them to the rice gently and keep the heat moderate.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, egg, sugar, vanilla, apricot, butter):

  1. Peachfits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Coconutfits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, egg, sugar, vanilla, apricot, butter. 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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