Skip to main content
Dessert

Apple Meringue

A dessert of boiled rice with stewed apples topped with stiff egg white meringue.

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

Why it works: Milk and rice are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,374 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Apple Meringue

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Boil the rice until thoroughly cooked, then place it in a pie dish.

  2. Stew the apples and lay them on top of the rice.

Top and serve

  1. Beat the egg whites to a stiff froth and place them lightly on top.

  2. Serve with cream or custard.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Milk + ricetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

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

  2. Apple + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,104 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  3. Apple + ricetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,311 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

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

Rice
Cooks into a soft, starchy base that holds the apple layer.
Apples
Stewed to a soft fruit layer that adds moisture and sweetness over the rice.
Egg whites
Beaten to a stiff froth, they set lightly on top as a airy meringue topping.
Milk
Gives the rice a creamy, tender texture as it cooks.

The step that matters

Beating the egg whites to a stiff froth. Egg whites need to be beaten until they hold firm peaks, which traps air and gives the meringue its lift. Under-beaten whites collapse and weep, while over-beaten whites turn dry and grainy.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, rice, sugar, egg):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Coconutfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, rice, sugar, egg. 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.

You might also like

Apple PuddingApple Pudding256 recipesRice CakeRice Cake120 recipesApple CakeApple Cake80 recipesDried Apple CakeDried Apple Cake51 recipes