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Dessert

German Fruit Pie

A fruit pie made with apples, cinnamon, molasses, and a buttery dough.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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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 ↓

German Fruit Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA rather quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Make the dough

  1. Sift together the baking powder and flour.

  2. Add the butter, salt, beaten egg, and enough sweet milk to make a soft dough.

  3. Roll out the dough to ½ inch thick.

Fill and bake

  1. Butter a square biscuit tin and cover the bottom and sides with the dough.

  2. Fill the pan with quartered juicy apples and sprinkle with cinnamon and molasses.

  3. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven until the crust and apples are light brown.

  4. Sprinkle a little sugar over the top five minutes before removing from 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. Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,598 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  2. Walnut + cinnamontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,147 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Flour
Forms the structure of the dough that holds the apples.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the dough, helping it rise and turn light.
Butter
Adds fat that tenderises the crust and helps it brown.
Egg
Binds the dough and adds structure and richness.
Apples
Provide moisture and tartness, and soften as they bake.
Molasses
Adds deep sweetness and colour that browns the filling.

The step that matters

Bake until light brown. Baking too briefly leaves the dough pale and doramy, while overbaking dries the apples and hardens the crust. Watching for light browning shows when the starch has set and the crust is cooked through.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, butter, walnut, egg, milk, cinnamon, molasses):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, walnut, egg, milk, cinnamon, molasses. 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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