Name: Compote of Pears, White
Ingredients: fine flavored dessert pears; slightly acidulated syrup; apple jelly

Why it works: Pear and apple match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 649 recipes. Both carry isoamyl acetate, which smells banana, fruity. The science ↓

Compote of Pears, White

Ingredients

fine flavored dessert pears
slightly acidulated syrup
apple jelly

Directions

Divide the pears in halves or quarters, removing the cores.
Pare and trim the pieces neatly.
Simmer the pears in slightly acidulated syrup until firm.
Dish up the pieces closely together.
Decorate the compote and cover it with a sheet of apple jelly.
Pour some syrup around the base.

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.

Pear + appletop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together649 recipes

Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, fruity).
Pear + syruptop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together254 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Syrup + appletop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together742 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).