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Dessert

Apple Snow-balls

Apple Snow-Balls are boiled apple dumplings made with rice, suet, currants, and a sweet filling.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,598 recipes. Both carry methyl cinnamate, which smells strawberry. The science ↓

Apple Snow-balls

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the apples

  1. Pare and core the apples without dividing them.

  2. Prepare the rice as per previous instructions.

  3. Enclose the apples in the rice and boil for 1 hour (10 minutes less for smaller apples).

Make the sauce and dumplings

  1. Mix fresh butter with sugar and powdered cinnamon or nutmeg; serve separately.

  2. For each dumpling, combine 3 tablespoons flour, 2 tablespoons suet, 3 tablespoons currants, a pinch of salt, and enough milk or water to make a thick batter.

  3. Tie the dumplings in well-floured cloths and boil for 1 hour.

Make the filling and serve

  1. For the filling, mix 10 ounces bread crumbs, ½ pound chopped beef suet, 1 tablespoon flour, lemon zest, 4 ounces sugar, and 3 to 4 beaten eggs with lemon juice.

  2. Divide into 4 portions, tie in cloths, and boil for 1 hour.

  3. Serve with syrup of preserved ginger if desired.

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

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  2. Rice + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,137 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

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

  5. Cinnamon + flourtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the filling and set firmly as it boils, holding the portions together.
Flour
Thickens the batter and helps the dumplings hold their shape while boiling.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the dumplings and filling moist and rich as they cook.
Bread crumbs
Give the filling body and soak up fat and liquid for a soft, cohesive texture.
Rice
Forms a starchy coating that encloses the apples and holds them whole while boiling.

The step that matters

Tying the dumplings in floured cloths. Flour on the cloth forms a thin skin that stops the batter sticking and keeps the dumpling's shape, so loose or unfloured cloths can cause it to break apart or stick while boiling.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (apple, rice, butter, sugar, cinnamon, flour, milk):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against apple, rice, butter, sugar, cinnamon, flour, milk. 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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