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Dessert

Apple Custard Pie

A baked pie filled with a sweet apple custard topped with meringue.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,104 recipes. Both carry 4-heptenal, which smells creamy, biscuit. The science ↓

Apple Custard Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the filling

  1. Mash the apples and rub through a colander.

  2. Mix the mashed apples with ½ cup sugar.

  3. In a bowl, combine 2 egg yolks, 3 tablespoons sugar, cornstarch or flour, milk, and a pinch of salt. Whip well.

  4. Pour the mixture into a saucepan and heat until it comes to a boil.

  5. Add the apples to the custard mixture and mix well. Remove from heat and let cool.

Bake and finish

  1. Line a pie pan with pie dough and pour the cooled mixture into it.

  2. Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) until set.

  3. Whip the egg whites until stiff, adding 2 tablespoons sugar gradually.

  4. Spread the meringue over the baked pie and return to the oven to brown.

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

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

  2. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

Egg yolks
Thicken the custard and add richness as they set during cooking.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard and adds creaminess.
Cornstarch or flour
Thickens the custard so it sets into a sliceable filling.
Apples
Provide the main flavor and moisture of the filling.
Egg whites
Whipped with sugar to form a stiff meringue that browns on top.

The step that matters

Cooling the custard before filling the crust. Adding the custard while hot can soften the raw pie dough and make the bottom soggy; cooling lets the starch and egg thicken it properly before baking.

Swap the apple

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

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

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