Why it works: Apricot and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,630 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Green Apricot Marmalade
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the apricots
Boil a small quantity of wood ashes in water, skimming off any charcoal bits.
Let the water stand, then draw off the clear liquid.
Bring the clear liquid to a boil and add the apricots to remove their down.
Once the down comes off easily, remove from heat and cool the apricots in cold water.
Rub the apricots clean with a cloth.
Alternatively, roll the apricots in salt in a towel until the down comes off, then wash them in water.
Boil the apricots until they can be crushed between your fingers.
Strain and pound the apricots in a mortar, then pass through a fine sieve.
Make the marmalade
Place the pulp in a pan over heat and dry until it begins to stick to the bottom.
Weigh the pulp and add an equal weight of sugar.
Clarify the sugar and boil it to a feather stage.
Add the pulp to the sugar and boil two or three times, stirring to prevent burning.
Transfer the marmalade to pots and store in a dry place.
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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Apricot + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together3,630 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Apricots
- Form the fruit base that is pulped, dried and cooked into the marmalade.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the marmalade and thickens it as it boils down with the pulp.
The step that matters
Drying the pulp until it begins to stick. Driving off excess water before adding sugar concentrates the fruit flavor and helps the marmalade set. Stirring keeps the sugar-rich mixture from scorching on the bottom of the pan.
“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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