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Dessert

Spiced Peaches

A preserve of peaches simmered in a spiced syrup with vinegar and brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Spiced Peaches

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the peaches

  1. Wipe the peaches and boil them briefly until the skin can be easily peeled.

  2. Make a syrup by combining ½ pound of sugar with ½ teacup of water for every pound of fruit.

  3. As the syrup boils, skim off any foam that rises to the surface.

  4. Add the peaches to the syrup and boil gently until they are tender.

  5. Remove the peaches carefully and set them aside.

Make the spiced liquid and fill jars

  1. In a separate pot, combine vinegar, brown sugar, and spices; boil well.

  2. Pour the spiced mixture over the peaches in jars.

  3. Add ½ pint of brandy to each jar before sealing.

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. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Peach + cinnamontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together625 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  3. Clove + macetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  4. Peach + clovetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together280 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  5. Cinnamon + macetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

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

What each ingredient does

Peaches
Provide the fruit that softens during boiling and forms the body of the preserves.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and helps preserve the fruit while contributing a deeper flavor.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the flavor and helps keep the preserves stable.
Sugar
Sweetens the syrup and helps preserve the fruit's texture and shape.

The step that matters

Boiling the peaches until tender. Boiling gently keeps the fruit intact while sugar syrup slowly penetrates it. Boiling too hard can break the peaches apart and make the texture mushy.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (peach, sugar, vinegar, cinnamon, clove, brandy):

  1. Allspicefits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Cardamomfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against peach, sugar, vinegar, cinnamon, clove, brandy. 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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