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Pork Chops and Fried Apples

Breaded pork chops fried with sliced sour apples.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Sage and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 507 recipes. Both carry 2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Pork Chops and Fried Apples

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pork

  1. Season the pork chops with coarse sea salt, black pepper, powdered sage, and sweet marjoram.

  2. Dip the seasoned chops into the beaten egg, then coat them with grated bread crumbs.

  3. Fry the chops in a skillet for 20 minutes until golden brown, then place them on a hot dish.

Fry the apples and serve

  1. Slice the sour apples into ¾-inch thick pieces, ensuring the core is in the middle of each slice.

  2. Fry the apple slices in the same skillet until they are nicely browned, turning them carefully to avoid breaking.

  3. Serve the fried apples on top of the pork chops or in a separate dish.

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. Sage + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together507 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  2. Pepper + marjoramtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,609 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Pepper + sagetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

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

  4. Sage + appletop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together755 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  5. Pork + sagetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,527 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

What each ingredient does

Pork chops
Provide the main meat, which browns and cooks through in the skillet.
Egg
Acts as a binder so the bread crumbs adhere to the chops.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden browned coating on the outside of the chops.
Sour apples
Add tartness that balances the rich, savory pork and fried coating.

The step that matters

Turning the apple slices. Apple slices are fragile and can break apart when moved while hot and soft. Turning them gently after the first side browns keeps the rings intact and lets the sugars caramelise evenly on both faces.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, pepper, sage, marjoram, egg, bread):

  1. Lemonfits better
  2. Limefits better
  3. Cherryfits about as well
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, pepper, sage, marjoram, egg, bread. 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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