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Dessert

Apple Tarts

Apple tarts filled with a thickened apple sauce mixture topped with meringue.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Apple Tarts

Ingredients

Directions

Make the shells

  1. Make shells from rich puff pastry.

Make the filling

  1. In a bowl, combine apple sauce, eggs, heavy cream, lemon juice, and granulated sugar.

  2. Cook the mixture until thickened.

Assemble and bake

  1. Fill the pastry shells with the apple mixture.

  2. Top the filled shells with meringue.

  3. Brown the tarts in the oven.

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. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Sauce + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Sauce + sugartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,147 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

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

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

Eggs
Set the filling into a custard as they cook, giving it body and structure.
Heavy cream
Adds richness and a smooth, tender texture to the filling.
Granulated sugar
Sweetens the filling and helps it thicken smoothly as it cooks.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the sweet apple flavor.
Apple sauce
Forms the main body of the filling and supplies apple flavor and moisture.

The step that matters

Cook the mixture until thickened. Eggs thicken when heated, but overcooking can make them curdle or turn grainy. Cook gently and stop once the filling coats a spoon so it sets smoothly rather than scrambling.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sauce, egg, cream, lemon, sugar):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raspberryfits better
  3. Orangefits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sauce, egg, cream, lemon, 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.

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