Name: Cherry Preserves
Ingredients: 20 pounds pitted cherries; 25 pounds granulated sugar; 2 gallons water

Cherry Preserves

Ingredients

20 pounds pitted cherries
25 pounds granulated sugar
2 gallons water

Directions

Cook the cherries

In a large kettle, add the water and pitted cherries.
Cook the cherries very slowly for 15 minutes.

Add the sugar and process

Add the sugar and continue cooking until the mixture reaches 220°F (104°C).
Process the preserves for 35 minutes at 180°F (82°C).

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

What each ingredient does

Pitted cherries: Provide the fruit base, flavor, and the pectin that helps the preserves set.
Granulated sugar: Adds sweetness, helps the preserves set, and reduces the water available to spoilage organisms.

The step that matters

Cooking the mixture to 220°F (104°C) after adding the sugar. At about 220°F the sugar concentration is high enough for the fruit's pectin to form a gel as the preserves cool. Stopping early leaves them runny, while cooking too long makes them stiff.

“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.