Name: Peach Butter
Ingredients: 50 gallons peach pulp; 10 gallons boiled cider; 60 pounds sugar

Why it works: Peach and cider work together. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 90 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓

Peach Butter

Ingredients

50 gallons peach pulp
10 gallons boiled cider
60 pounds sugar

Directions

Cook the boiled cider as you would for apple butter.
Add the peach pulp and cook until the mixture reaches 218°F (103°C).
Process the mixture as you would for apple butter.

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.

Peach + cidertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together90 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Peach + sugartop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,308 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Cider + sugartop 27% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3,308 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Peach pulp: Forms the bulk of the butter, supplying the main fruit flavor and body as it cooks down.
Boiled cider: Adds concentrated apple flavor and natural sweetness to the peach.
Sugar: Adds sweetness and helps the butter thicken and keep as moisture cooks off.

The step that matters

Cooking the peach pulp to 218°F (103°C). Reaching this temperature shows enough water has evaporated for the butter to thicken. Stopping early leaves it runny and more likely to spoil, while cooking too long can scorch the sugars and fruit on the bottom of the pot.