Name: Apple Pie
Ingredients: 8 Russeting or Lemon Pippin Apples; 4 Cloves; 4 ounces good Moist Sugar; Lemon Peel (to taste); Quince Jam (optional); Puff Paste (for covering)

Why it works: Clove and quince match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 164 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Apple Pie

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).
Pare, core, and quarter the apples.
Place the apple quarters in a pie dish as close together as possible.
Add the cloves.
In a mortar, rub together the lemon peel and sugar. If desired, mix in some quince jam.

Bake

Cover the apples with puff paste.
Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes, until golden brown.

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.

Clove + quincetop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together164 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
Lemon + clovetop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together8,150 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Lemon + quincetop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together336 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together53,532 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sugar + quincetop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,444 recipes

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

Lemon and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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: Provide the bulk of the filling, becoming tender and soft as they bake.
Sugar: Adds sweetness and helps draw out juices that form the syrup in the filling.
Puff paste: Forms the flaky, golden top crust that covers the apples.
Cloves: Add a warm, aromatic spice flavour to the apples.
Quince jam: Adds concentrated fruit flavour and extra body to the filling.