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Dessert

Orange Preserves

A sweet preserve made from sliced oranges, sugar, water, and baking soda, cooked to a thick consistency.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Orange and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 20% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,212 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Orange Preserves

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the oranges

  1. Slice the oranges into circles about ½ inch thick.

  2. Soak the orange slices in cold water for 24 hours, changing the water once.

  3. Blanch the oranges in a solution of baking soda and 10 gallons of water for 10 minutes.

  4. Transfer the blanched oranges to cold fresh water for 15 minutes.

Cook the preserves

  1. In a kettle, combine the oranges and 2 gallons of water, and cook slowly for 5 minutes.

  2. Add the sugar and cook until the mixture reaches 220°F (104°C).

  3. Process the preserves for 30 minutes at 170°F (77°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

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. Orange + sugartop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,212 recipes

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

Orange and sugar 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

Small california naval oranges
Supply the fruit and peel that form the tender, edible body of the preserves.
Granulated sugar
Draws water out of the fruit and thickens the syrup, giving sweetness and body.
Baking soda
Its alkalinity softens the peel and tissue during blanching, making the slices more tender.

The step that matters

Cooking the sugar to 220°F (104°C). Sugar concentration must rise high enough for the syrup to thicken and preserve the fruit. Stopping early leaves a thin, runny product that may spoil sooner.

“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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