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Dessert

Apple Float

Apple Float is a dessert of stewed apples folded into stiff egg whites, served over boiled custard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,478 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Apple Float

Ingredients

Directions

Make the apple fluff

  1. In a bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff.

  2. Gradually add the sugar while continuing to beat until stiff peaks form.

  3. Fold in the strained apples gently until well combined.

Serve

  1. Spoon the mixture onto a dish of boiled custard.

  2. Flavor the custard as desired before serving.

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

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

  2. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Apple + eggtop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,461 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

Apple and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 16,478 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 whites
Whipped into a foam that traps air, giving the dish its light, airy texture.
Sugar
Stabilizes the whipped whites so the foam holds its shape, and adds sweetness.
Stewed apples
Add moisture and apple flavor, and lighten the foam as they are folded in.

The step that matters

Fold in the strained apples gently. Whipped egg white foam holds its air only while it is intact. Vigorous stirring knocks out the trapped air and makes the mixture dense and runny, so the apples should be folded in with a light, lifting motion.

Swap the apple

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against 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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