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Dessert

Squash or Pumpkin Pie

A pie made with squash, corn starch, sugar, egg, butter, milk, spices, and a crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 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 ↓

Squash or Pumpkin Pie

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

  1. In a bowl, combine squash, corn starch, sugar, egg, melted butter, ginger, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

  2. Stir thoroughly before adding milk. Mix until well combined.

Bake

  1. Pour into a pie crust and bake until set.

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. Ginger + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Ginger + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,324 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

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

  5. Corn + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together647 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

What each ingredient does

Squash
Provides the pumpkin flavour and the bulk of the filling.
Egg
Sets the custard as it heats, giving the pie structure once baked.
Corn starch
Thickens the filling so it holds its shape when sliced.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the spices.
Milk
Adds liquid that makes the filling smooth and custard-like.

The step that matters

Bake until set. Egg proteins coagulate as the custard heats, so the pie must be baked until the centre is firm. Pulling it too early leaves a runny filling that will not slice cleanly.

Swap the ginger

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

  1. Cardamomfits better
  2. Clovefits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. Gingerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against corn, sugar, egg, butter, milk, cinnamon, 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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