Why it works: Rhubarb and flour match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 670 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Rhubarb Pie
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.
Prepare the filling
Cover the chopped rhubarb with boiling water and let it stand for 2 minutes.
Drain the rhubarb and mix in the beaten egg yolk, flour, and sugar.
Bake and finish
Pour the mixture into a pie crust and bake with only a lower crust at 350°F (175°C).
Whip the egg white to make a meringue, pour it over the pie, and brown it.
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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Rhubarb + flourtop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together670 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Rhubarb + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,852 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
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Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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
- Rhubarb
- Provides the tart flavour that the sugar balances in the filling.
- Egg yolk
- Thickens the filling as it bakes and adds richness.
- Flour
- Helps thicken the filling so it holds its shape when sliced.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the filling and offsets the sharpness of the rhubarb.
- Egg white
- Whips into a meringue that bakes to a light, browned topping.
The step that matters
Browning the meringue. Whipped egg white needs to be spread over the filling and browned in the oven. Underbaked meringue stays soft and weeps, while overbaking can make it tough and scorched, so watch the color closely.
Swap the rhubarb
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, flour, sugar):
- Jalapenofits better
- Cinnamonfits better
- Nutmegfits better
- Rhubarbthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against egg, flour, 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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