Why it works: Milk and apple 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 Fritters
Ingredients
Directions
Make the batter
In a bowl, mix sweet milk, flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt.
Heat the milk until it is slightly warmer than body temperature.
Slowly add the warm milk to the beaten egg yolks and sugar.
Fold in the flour and beaten egg whites until combined.
Gently stir in the thin slices of sour apples, coating them with batter.
Fry and serve
Drop spoonfuls of the batter with apple slices into boiling lard.
Fry until golden brown, then remove and drain on paper towels.
Serve warm with maple syrup or a sweet syrup made of sugar.
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.
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Milk + appletop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,104 recipes
Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).
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Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Sugar + appletop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together16,478 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Milk and flour 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
- Flour
- Forms the main structure of the batter that holds the fritter together.
- Eggs
- Yolks add richness and whites, folded in, lighten the batter for a softer interior.
- Baking powder
- Releases gas in the batter, helping the fritters rise and become airy.
- Sweet milk
- Supplies the liquid that hydrates the flour and gives the batter its moisture.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the exterior brown during frying.
- Sour apples
- Add tart acidity that contrasts with the sweet batter and soft fruit flavor.
The step that matters
Drop the batter into boiling lard. The hot fat sets the outside of each fritter quickly, so it cooks through without soaking up grease. If the lard is not hot enough, the fritters become greasy and dense.
Swap the apple
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, flour, egg, sugar):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Figfits better
- Applethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against milk, flour, egg, 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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