Why it works: Peach and apricot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 342 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
Fruit Paste
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the apples
Peel, core, and slice the apples, then soak them in water with sulphite of soda to keep them white.
Combine the apple slices with 2 quarts of water for every 30 pounds of apples in a kettle and boil, stirring continuously until the apples are cooked and melted.
Pass the juice and pulp through a fine sieve, mixing it with an equal quantity of pulp from the desired fruit.
Make the paste
Boil sugar and water until it forms a ball when tested in cold water, then mix the result with the fruit pulp.
Boil briefly on high heat, add aniline for color, and pour the mixture onto a tin plate in layers ¼ to ⅓ inch thick.
Dry and crystallize
Allow the layers to dry for one day in a warm room used for drying candied fruits.
Cut the dried paste into disks, stars, or other shapes, and place them in crystallization boxes to crystallize like candied fruits.
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.
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Peach + apricottop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together342 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Raspberry + peachtop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together190 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Apple + quincetop 1% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together506 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).
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Apple + apricottop 2% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together777 recipes
Shared aroma: gamma-undecalactone (peach, sweet).
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Raspberry + strawberrytop 2% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together815 recipes
Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Fine white apples
- Provide pectin and body, forming the firm, sliceable base of the paste.
- Equal weight of cooked sugar
- Sweetens the paste and, as it cooks and sets, helps it dry firm and crystallize.
- Equal quantity of pulp from desired fruit
- Supplies the characteristic fruit flavor and aroma of the finished paste.
The step that matters
Cooking the sugar to the ball stage. Sugar cooked to the firm-ball stage gives the paste enough set to hold its shape when dried. Undercooked sugar leaves it soft and sticky, while overcooking can make it hard and brittle.
Swap the quince
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (apple, raspberry, strawberry, peach, apricot, sugar):
- Vanillafits better
- Pearfits better
- Plumfits better
- Quincethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against apple, raspberry, strawberry, peach, apricot, 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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