Skip to main content
Dessert

Jellied Prunes

A chilled dessert made by setting prunes in gelatin with sugar, served with whipped cream or custard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Almond and orange are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,125 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Jellied Prunes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the prunes

  1. Soak ½ lb prunes overnight in cold water.

  2. Cook the prunes in the same water until tender, adding a few slices of lemon.

  3. Remove the stones.

  4. Soak 1 oz gelatin in ½ cup water.

  5. Dissolve it in the hot prunes.

  6. Cut into small pieces.

  7. Remove the lemon slices.

  8. Add ½ cup sugar, stirring until dissolved.

Set and serve

  1. Decorate a mold with halves of blanched almonds.

  2. Cover them with seeded prunes.

  3. When set, add the rest of the prune mixture.

  4. Leave it in a cold place until firm.

  5. Turn out.

  6. Serve with whipped cream or boiled custard.

  7. Add ½ cup orange marmalade.

  8. Garnish with thinly sliced bananas.

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. Almond + orangetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,125 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Orange + bananatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,118 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  3. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  4. Almond + bananatop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together377 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

  5. Almond + creamtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,130 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

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

What each ingredient does

Prunes
Provide the main fruit body and flavour, softened by soaking and cooking into a tender base.
Gelatin
Sets the prune liquid into a firm, sliceable jelly as it cools in a cold place.
Sugar
Sweetens the jelly and balances the tartness of the cooked prunes.

The step that matters

Dissolve the gelatin fully in the hot prunes. Gelatin must be completely dissolved and not boiled, otherwise it will not set evenly. Undissolved granules leave soft spots, and overheating weakens its gelling strength.

Swap the orange

The recipe marks orange as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, almond, cream, banana):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Coconutfits better
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, almond, cream, banana. 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.

You might also like

Orange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipesOrange Cream Rice PuddingOrange Cream Rice Pudding121 recipesOrange GelatinOrange Gelatin100 recipesOrange SherbetOrange Sherbet73 recipes