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Dessert

Orange Pie

A custard pie made with orange zest, juice, sugar, flour, egg yolks, butter, and topped with whipped egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Orange Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the filling

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Grate the rind of one orange.

  3. Juice two oranges.

  4. In a bowl, mix sugar and flour together.

  5. Add the beaten egg yolks and melted butter to the sugar mixture.

Bake the pie

  1. Pour the mixture into a pie crust.

  2. Bake until it resembles a finely baked custard.

Top and brown

  1. Whip the egg whites until stiff. Add 2 tablespoons of sugar to the whipped egg whites and mix well.

  2. Spread the whipped egg whites over the baked pie.

  3. Return to the oven to brown slightly.

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. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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
Yolks thicken the filling into a custard, and whipped whites form the light topping.
Sugar
Sweetens the filling and helps stabilize the whipped egg white topping.
Flour
Thickens the orange filling so it sets into a sliceable custard.
Butter
Adds richness and a tender texture to the filling.
Oranges
Provide the juice for liquid and acidity, and the zest for aroma.

The step that matters

Baking the filling until it resembles a finely baked custard. Egg yolks and flour set as the filling heats. Underbaking leaves it runny, while overbaking can make it weep or turn rubbery, so watch for a set, custard-like surface.

Swap the orange

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

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

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