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Dessert

Pieplant Pie

A pie made with eggs, sugar, chopped rhubarb, and a meringue topping.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and rhubarb are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,852 recipes. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓

Pieplant 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

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Make the filling

  1. Beat 1 egg and 2 egg whites with 1 cup of sugar until well combined.

  2. Add 1 cup of chopped rhubarb and mix thoroughly.

  3. Pour the mixture into a pie crust and bake until set.

Make the meringue and finish

  1. Beat the reserved egg whites with 2 tablespoons of sugar until stiff peaks form.

  2. Spread the meringue on top of the pie and brown it in the oven.

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. Sugar + rhubarbtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,852 recipes

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

  2. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Egg + rhubarbtop 31% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together570 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set the filling into a custard-like structure as they bake, and whites whip into the meringue.
Sugar
Sweetens the filling and helps stabilise the whipped egg white meringue.
Rhubarb
Adds tartness and moisture that balances the sweetness of the filling.

The step that matters

Beat the egg whites to stiff peaks. Whites must be whipped until they hold firm peaks, or the meringue will be runny and may weep. Spreading it fully to the edges helps it brown evenly without shrinking away from the crust.

Swap the rhubarb

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Rhubarbthe original
  4. Gingerfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar. 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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