Skip to main content
Dessert

Apple Fritters

Apple fritters are fried apple slices dipped in batter, flavored with brandy, sugar, and lemon rind.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Apple and brandy are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,291 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Apple Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the apples

  1. Cut the apples into thin rounds and remove the cores. Peel the skin off.

  2. Place the apple slices in a dish and pour the brandy over them. Sprinkle with sugar and grated lemon rind. Let sit for 1 hour.

Fry and serve

  1. Half fill a saucepan with clarified dripping and heat until hot with blue smoke rising.

  2. Dip each apple slice into the batter, then carefully place it into the hot fat using a tablespoon.

  3. Fry until the fritters are crisp and lightly browned, then remove and drain on kitchen paper.

  4. Sift white sugar over the fritters and serve.

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 + brandytop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,291 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  2. Apple + lemontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,551 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  3. Apple + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together16,478 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  5. Brandy + sugartop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together11,939 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Apple and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 16,478 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Apples
Provide the fruit filling that softens and becomes sweet-tart under the crisp batter coating.
Batter
Forms a crisp, golden coating that traps steam and protects the apple while it fries.
Brandy
Adds aroma and flavour to the apples during their soaking time.
Sugar
Sweetens the apples and adds a light sweet finish on the fried fritters.

The step that matters

Heating the dripping to the right temperature. If the fat is too cool, the batter absorbs oil and turns greasy; if it is too hot, the outside browns before the apple softens. Steady heat gives a crisp, evenly cooked fritter.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Apricotfits better
  2. Pearfits better
  3. Vanillafits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against apple, brandy, 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.

More apple fritters recipes

Potato 3 See all 377 →

You might also like

Apple PuddingApple Pudding256 recipesLemon CakeLemon Cake228 recipesLemon IceLemon Ice147 recipesLemon SherbetLemon Sherbet103 recipes