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Dessert

Apple Roll

A boiled pastry filled with apples, sultanas, and breadcrumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,790 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Apple Roll

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pastry

  1. In a bowl, mix the flour, suet, salt, and baking powder with enough water to form a stiff paste.

  2. Roll out the paste to about 4 inches thick.

Make the filling and roll

  1. In another bowl, combine the apples, syrup, lemon juice and rind, sultanas, and bread crumbs.

  2. Spread the apple mixture over the rolled paste and roll it up tightly, pinching the ends to seal.

Boil and serve

  1. Tie the roll in a cloth and place it in boiling water.

  2. Boil for 1.5 to 2 hours.

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 + breadtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,790 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

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

  3. Syrup + flourtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,540 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Lemon + flourtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Bread + lemontop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,445 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Forms the structure of the paste that wraps the filling.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the pastry rich and tender during boiling.
Baking powder
Releases gas that helps the pastry rise and lighten.
Apples
Provide moisture and tartness, and soften into the filling.
Lyle's golden syrup
Adds sweetness and a moist, sticky texture to the filling.
Bread crumbs
Absorb liquid from the apples and syrup, helping the filling hold its shape.

The step that matters

Rolling and sealing the roll. If the roll is not tight and the ends are not pinched shut, the filling can leak out and water can enter during boiling, making the pastry soggy.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (apple, bread, syrup, flour):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Pearfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against apple, bread, syrup, flour. 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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