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Jam Making and Preserved Fruits

This recipe describes how to make jam from dry, ripe fruit and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and syrup match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,842 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Jam Making and Preserved Fruits

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Pick over the dry, ripe fruit to remove stems and decayed matter.

  2. Weigh the fruit and place it in a large pot.

Cook

  1. Add sugar (12 to 16 ounces per pound of fruit) and heat over medium heat until boiling.

  2. Boil the mixture for 20 minutes, skimming off any foam that forms.

  3. If using, add glucose syrup and vegetable coloring, then stir well.

Jar

  1. Pour the hot jam into sterilized jars and seal.

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. Sugar + syruptop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,842 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Fruit
Provides the main flavor, body and pectin that help the jam set.
Sugar
Sweetens the jam and, with boiling, thickens it and helps it keep.
Glucose syrup
Slows sugar crystallization and adds smooth texture and sweetness.

The step that matters

Boiling and skimming the mixture. The mixture must reach a full boil and be held there long enough for sugar concentration and pectin to set the jam. Skimming removes foam so the final jam is clear and smooth.

“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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