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Dessert

Apple Cheesecakes

A baked dessert of apples, cake crumbs, butter, lemon, sugar, egg, and pastry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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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 ↓

Apple Cheesecakes

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the filling

  1. Slice the apples and place them in a pan with butter, sugar, and lemon juice.

  2. Cover and cook until soft.

  3. Beat to a smooth pulp.

  4. When cool, add cake crumbs and the egg yolk.

  5. Fold in the beaten egg white.

Bake and serve

  1. Line deep patty tins with pastry.

  2. Fill the tins with the mixture.

  3. Bake at 400°F (200°C) for 10 to 20 minutes.

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 + lemontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,551 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Apple + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,706 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  3. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked 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 the bulk and moisture of the filling, softening into a smooth pulp when cooked.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smoother, more tender texture.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the tartness of the apples and lemon.
Egg
Binds the filling and helps it set as it bakes.
Cake crumbs
Absorb excess moisture and help thicken the filling.
Lemon
Adds acidity and fresh aroma that brighten the apple flavour.

The step that matters

Let the apple pulp cool before adding the egg yolk and white. Hot pulp can cook the raw egg yolk and white unevenly, causing lumps or scrambled bits instead of a smooth, evenly set filling.

Swap the apple

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Orangefits better
  3. Raspberryfits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, lemon, sugar, 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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