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Dessert

Ground Cherry Jam

Jam made from ground cherries, sugar, lemon juice, and sliced lemons.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 53,532 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Ground Cherry Jam

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Husk and wash the ground cherries well.

  2. Weigh the cherries and add an equal amount of sugar.

  3. Add the juice of 3 lemons and the thinly sliced lemons, cut into small pieces.

Cook and seal

  1. Cook the mixture over low heat for 1.5 to 2 hours until thick.

  2. Pour into jars and seal.

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 + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Ground cherries
Provide the main fruit flavor and pectin-containing body for the jam.
Sugar
Sweetens the jam and helps it thicken and keep as it cooks down.
Lemons
Add acidity that brightens flavor and helps the jam set.

The step that matters

Cook over low heat until thick. Low heat cooks the jam down gradually, reducing the water and concentrating sugar and fruit without scorching. Cooking time is long, so the jam must be checked for thickness before sealing.

“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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