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Dessert

Centennial Apple Pie

A baked apple pie with a puff pastry crust and a spiced apple filling.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Centennial 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 the filling

  1. Peel and core the apples, then cut them into small pieces.

  2. Place the apples in a saucepan with a little water, cinnamon, cloves, and lemon rind.

  3. Stew over low heat until the apples are soft.

  4. Sweeten to taste, then pass the mixture through a fine sieve.

Assemble and bake

  1. Add the egg yolks, egg white, butter, grated nutmeg, lemon peel, and lemon juice; mix well.

  2. Line a pie dish with puff pastry, fill it with the apple mixture, and bake at 350°F (175°C) for 30 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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,598 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  5. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Apples
Provide the main body and flavor of the pie filling once stewed and sieved.
Egg yolks
Enrich the filling and help it set into a custard-like texture when baked.
Egg white
Adds structure and helps the filling set as it bakes.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, silky mouthfeel to the filling.
Sugar
Sweetens the apple mixture and balances the acidity of the lemon.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the flavor of the apples and balances sweetness.

The step that matters

Sieving the stewed apples. Pushing the cooked apples through a fine sieve makes them smooth and free of lumps or peel. Cooking them until fully soft first is what allows them to pass through easily and blend evenly with the eggs and butter.

Swap the apple

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against cinnamon, clove, lemon, sugar, egg, butter, nutmeg. 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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