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Dessert

Apple Tartlets

Apple tartlets made with puff pastry, chopped apples, sugar, whipped cream, and red currant jelly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Apple Tartlets

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Bake the tartlets

  1. Place the puff pastry pieces in tart pans and press them into the scallops.

  2. Fill each pastry with chopped apple and a sprinkle of sugar.

  3. Bake in the oven until golden and let cool.

Finish and serve

  1. Whip the cream until stiff, then mix in a little sugar and a drop of essence of lemon or vanilla.

  2. Before serving, add a dollop of whipped cream on each tartlet and top with two strips of red currant jelly in a cross shape.

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. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  2. Lemon + red curranttop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together309 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  3. Apple + red curranttop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together111 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  4. Apple + lemontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,551 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

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

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

Puff pastry
Forms the flaky, crisp shell that holds the filling.
Chopped apple
Provides the fruit filling that softens and sweetens as it bakes.
Cream
Whipped to stiff peaks, it adds a light, airy topping.
Red currant jelly
Adds glossy color and tart-sweet flavor on top.

The step that matters

Whipping the cream until stiff. Cream whips best when cold and stops at stiff peaks; overwhipping turns it grainy and can cause it to separate, while underwhipping leaves it too loose to hold its shape on the tartlet.

Swap the red currant

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Orangefits better
  3. Pearfits better
  4. Red currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against apple, sugar, cream, lemon. 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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