Why it works: Cinnamon and apple 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 ↓
Apple and Rice 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.
Cook the rice
Combine rice, milk, sugar, lemon peel, and cinnamon in a pot. Cook until the rice is soft.
Fill a large high mold with the cooked rice.
Make the apple sauce
Prepare fresh apple sauce and sweeten it with lemon peel flavor.
Bake and serve
Place the mold in a saucepan of water and bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for 30 minutes.
Turn the cooked rice onto a dish and fill the center with apple sauce.
Beat the egg whites until frothy and spread them over the apple sauce to create a top layer.
Sift powdered sugar over the entire dish and lightly brown the top before serving.
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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Cinnamon + appletop 4% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,598 recipes
Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).
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Rice + cinnamontop 4% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together2,137 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
-
Lemon + cinnamontop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together7,950 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
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Rice + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,374 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked 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
- Rice
- Forms the pudding body, softening as it cooks in milk to a creamy base.
- Milk
- Cooks with the rice to give a soft, creamy texture and moisture.
- Egg whites
- Beaten into a foam, they set during baking to form a light top layer.
- Apple sauce
- Adds moisture and fruity sweetness to the filling beneath the topping.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the top layer brown lightly.
The step that matters
Beating the egg whites until frothy. Egg whites trap air when beaten, and that foam sets in the oven to form the light top layer. Under-beaten whites stay runny and spread into the apple sauce, while over-beaten whites turn dry and grainy.
Swap the apple
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, milk, sugar, lemon, cinnamon, sauce, egg):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Orangefits better
- Applethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against rice, milk, sugar, lemon, cinnamon, sauce, egg. 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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