Why it works: Apple and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,598 recipes. Both carry methyl cinnamate, which smells strawberry. The science ↓
Bread and Apple Pudding
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.
Butter an earthen baking dish.
Layer chopped apples at the bottom.
Sprinkle with sugar, cinnamon, and a few bits of butter.
Cover with fine bread crumbs.
Repeat layers until the dish is full, finishing with a layer of bread crumbs on top.
Cover the dish and bake at 350°F (175°C) for about 45 minutes.
Remove the cover and bake until the top is nicely browned.
Serve warm with a hard sauce of butter and sugar or a sweet liquid sauce.
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.
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Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,598 recipes
Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).
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Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together30,779 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Apple + breadtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,790 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Apple + buttertop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,706 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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
Swap the apple
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, cinnamon, butter, bread):
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits about as well
- Raisinfits about as well
- Applethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cinnamon, butter, bread. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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