Why it works: Plum and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,313 recipes. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓
Plum Taut
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
Roll out the short crust and line a deep tart dish.
Fill and bake
Fill the dish with plums and place a small cup or jar upside down in the center.
Sprinkle the sugar over the plums and cover the pie with the remaining crust, decorating the edges.
Bake in the oven for 30 to 45 minutes.
Puff pastry variation
For puff pastry, use the same method and glaze the top with beaten egg white, then sprinkle with sifted sugar before baking.
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.
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Plum + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,313 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Short crust
- Forms the structure of the tart and bakes into a crisp, rich base.
- Plums
- Supply the fruit filling, with juices that moisten and flavour the tart.
- Moist sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps draw out and thicken the fruit juices.
The step that matters
Place the cup or jar in the center of the plums. As the fruit heats, its juices turn to steam. The upturned cup lets that steam escape through the filling instead of building pressure under the top crust, which could split it or push out juice.
“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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