Skip to main content
Dessert

Jim Jam Preserves

A jam made from currant juice, raspberries, raisins, orange pulp and rind, sweetened with sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Currant and raisin are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,180 recipes. Both carry gamma-nonanolactone, which smells coconut, creamy. The science ↓

Jim Jam Preserves

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Combine currant juice, red raspberries, raisins, orange pulp, and orange rind in a large pot.

  2. Add granulated sugar and stir well.

  3. Cook over low heat for 1 hour, simmering gently.

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. Currant + raisintop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,180 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).

  2. Raisin + orangetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,684 recipes

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

  3. Raisin + sugartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,481 recipes

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

  4. Currant + orangetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,034 recipes

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

  5. Orange + sugartop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,212 recipes

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

Orange and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 19,212 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

Currant juice
Provides tart liquid and acidity that balances the sweetness and helps the fruit set.
Red raspberries
Adds fruit body, aroma and flavour to the preserve.
Raisins
Add concentrated sweetness and chewy body to the preserve.
Granulated sugar
Sweetens and, with the fruit's pectin and acid, helps the preserve thicken and set while preserving it.
Orange pulp and rind
Add bright citrus flavour, aroma and some natural pectin from the rind.

The step that matters

Simmering gently over low heat. Sugar must dissolve fully and the mixture must cook slowly at a gentle simmer. Too hard a boil can scorch the sugar and fruit on the bottom of the pot, while too little cooking leaves the preserve runny because pectin and sugar need time to reach setting concentration.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Lemonfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against raisin, orange, 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.

You might also like

Orange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipesOrange Cream Rice PuddingOrange Cream Rice Pudding121 recipesOrange GelatinOrange Gelatin100 recipesOrange SherbetOrange Sherbet73 recipes