Why it works: Apple and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,551 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓
Baked Apple Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Make the filling
Beat the butter and sugar together until creamy.
Stir in the egg yolks, lemon juice, and grated apples.
Gently fold in the beaten egg whites.
Bake and serve
Line a dish with pastry, pour in the mixture, and bake until nicely browned.
Serve cold.
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 + lemontop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,551 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Apple + buttertop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,706 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,227 recipes
Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
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Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together98,233 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Apples
- Provide bulk and moisture, and their pectin and acidity help give the filling body and flavor.
- Butter
- Creams with the sugar to add richness and a tender, fine texture to the filling.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the filling and, creamed with butter, traps air that lightens the texture.
- Eggs
- Yolks enrich and bind the filling, while whites folded in add lift and a lighter set.
- Lemon juice
- Adds acidity that brightens the sweetness and balances the rich filling.
The step that matters
Fold in the egg whites gently. Beaten whites hold air that gives the pudding its lift. Stirring them vigorously knocks that air out, leaving a denser, heavier result.
Swap the apple
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, egg, lemon):
- Vanillafits better
- Orangefits better
- Raspberryfits better
- Applethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, lemon. 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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