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Dessert

Lime Preserves

A preserved lime recipe using salt, water, soda, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Lime and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 29% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,332 recipes. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓

Lime Preserves

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the limes

  1. Lay limes in a saltwater solution strong enough to float an egg, covering them until warm weather ends.

  2. Cut limes to remove all seeds.

  3. Soak the cut limes in cold water for one day, changing the water often to remove salt.

  4. Boil the limes in water with 1 teaspoon of soda per 6 quarts of water until tender enough to pierce with a straw.

  5. Soak the boiled limes again in cold water for one day, changing the water often.

Make the syrup and preserve

  1. For each pound of fruit, use 2.5 pounds of white sugar and 3 pints of water.

  2. Boil the syrup for 15 minutes.

  3. Add the fruit to the syrup and cook for 5 minutes.

  4. Remove the fruit and place it in jars.

  5. Cook the syrup for an additional 15 minutes before pouring it over the fruit.

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. Lime + sugartop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,332 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

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

What each ingredient does

Limes
Provide the fruit that is softened and preserved, giving the preserve its main flavor and body.
Coarse sea salt
Draws water out of the limes during soaking, helping to firm the fruit and reduce bitterness.
Soda
Alkaline boiling water softens the lime peel so it becomes tender enough to pierce.
White sugar
Forms a thick syrup that sweetens the fruit and preserves it by drawing out moisture.

The step that matters

Boiling the limes until tender. Boiling with soda must be carried only until the peel is tender enough to pierce with a straw. Overcooking breaks the fruit down into mush, while undercooking leaves the peel tough and bitter.

“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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