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Rhubarb and Orange Marmalade

A preserved spread made from rhubarb, oranges, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Rhubarb and orange work together. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 299 recipes. Both carry 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol, which smells clove, smoky. The science ↓

Rhubarb and Orange Marmalade

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fruit

  1. Wash and cut the rhubarb (unpeeled) into small pieces.

  2. Sprinkle the sugar over the rhubarb and let it stand overnight.

  3. Grate the rind of the oranges and press out the juice.

  4. Add 1½ pounds of sugar to the orange juice and rind; mix all together.

Cook and jar

  1. Boil the mixture for 20 minutes.

  2. Pour into jelly glasses and cover with paraffin.

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. Rhubarb + orangetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together299 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol (clove, smoky).

  2. Rhubarb + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,852 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + orangetop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,212 recipes

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

Sugar and orange 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

Rhubarb
Provides the tart flavour and the bulk of the marmalade.
Sugar
Sweetens the fruit and helps the mixture thicken and preserve when boiled.
Oranges
Adds citrus aroma and acidity from the rind and juice.

The step that matters

Boil the mixture for 20 minutes. Boiling dissolves the sugar and concentrates the mixture so it sets as a preserve. Boiling too briefly can leave it runny and more prone to spoiling in the jar.

Swap the orange

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits about as well
  3. Quincefits about as well
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rhubarb, 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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