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Dessert

Apple Fritters

Apple fritters are battered apple slices fried in lard and served with loaf sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,623 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Apple Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, beat the eggs until smooth.

  2. Add flour, salt, and nutmeg, and mix well.

  3. Gradually add milk until the batter is like stiff cream.

Fry and serve

  1. Dip the apple slices into the batter.

  2. Fry the battered apples in hot lard until golden brown.

  3. Remove from the lard and place on a sieve to drain.

  4. Serve neatly and sprinkle with loaf sugar.

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 + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  3. Milk + appletop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,104 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  4. Nutmeg + appletop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,790 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Nutmeg + creamtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,920 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Beaten eggs give the batter structure and help it set and bind to the apple slices.
Flour
Flour thickens the batter so it coats the apple slices and holds together while frying.
Milk
Milk loosens the flour and eggs into a stiff batter that clings thickly to the fruit.
Apples
Apple slices are the main filling, softening inside while the batter crisps outside.

The step that matters

Fry the battered apples in hot lard until golden brown. If the lard is not hot enough, the batter absorbs fat and turns greasy instead of crisping quickly. Frying in hot fat sets the coating fast, so the apple cooks through without becoming soggy.

Swap the apple

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, flour, nutmeg, milk, cream, 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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