Name: Fruit in Brandy
Ingredients: Cherries; Peaches; Apricots; Green gages; Mirabelle plums; Pears; Old French brandy; Brown sugar-candy; Water

Why it works: Plum and pear match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 245 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Fruit in Brandy

Ingredients

Directions

Select fruits such as cherries, peaches, apricots, green gages, mirabelle plums, and pears for preservation.
Choose a barrel that can hold the amount of brandy you plan to use.
Calculate the amount of water needed to dilute the brandy to thirty degrees.
Dissolve brown sugar-candy in the diluted brandy and boil until it reaches a pearl stage.

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.

Plum + peartop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together245 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Peach + apricottop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together342 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Apricot + plumtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together284 recipes

Shared aroma: damascenone (apple, rose).
Peach + plumtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together163 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Apricot + peartop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together218 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

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

Swap the pear

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (peach, apricot, plum, brandy, sugar):

Vanillafits about as well
Pearthe original
Figfits less well
Applefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against peach, apricot, plum, brandy, sugar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.