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Dessert

An Apple Hedge-hog, or Suedoise

A layered apple dessert with apricot marmalade, egg icing, and toasted almond spikes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and apricot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 777 recipes. Both carry gamma-undecalactone, which smells peach, sweet. The science ↓

An Apple Hedge-hog, or Suedoise

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare the apples

  1. Stew the apples in a syrup made with water and sugar until tender.

  2. Drain the apples and arrange them in a dish in layers.

Assemble and top

  1. Fill the spaces between the apples with apricot marmalade and cover the top with it.

  2. Beat the eggs to a solid froth and mix with sugar for icing.

  3. Spread the icing evenly over the dish and sift fine sugar on top.

  4. Stick blanched almond spikes over the surface.

Bake

  1. Bake in a moderate oven (350°F/175°C) until the almonds are browned and the apples are 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. Apple + apricottop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together777 recipes

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

  2. Apricot + almondtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together852 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Apple + almondtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,025 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Sugar + almondtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,679 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

  5. 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

Apples
Form the bulk of the dessert and soften into a tender, moist layer when stewed.
Eggs
Beaten to a froth, they set in the oven to form the light, sturdy icing topping.
Apricot marmalade
Fills the gaps and coats the top, adding sweetness, moisture and a glossy finish.
Sugar
Sweetens the stewing syrup and the icing, and helps the icing brown in the oven.

The step that matters

Beating the eggs to a solid froth. Whipped egg whites trap air that gives the icing its lift and light structure. If they are under-beaten or greasy, the icing stays dense and may not set well over the fruit.

Swap the almond

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

  1. Almondthe original
  2. Hazelnutfits about as well
  3. Chestnutfits about as well
  4. Pistachiofits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against apple, sugar, apricot, egg. 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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