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Canning Fruit

A method for preserving peaches, pears, plums, berries, and other fruit by canning them in jars with optional sugar syrup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Pear and plum 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 ↓

Canning Fruit

Ingredients

Directions

Pack and process

  1. Fill a glass jar or tin can with fruit, leaving no space.

  2. Place the jar or can in a large pot filled with water, ensuring the water is two-thirds up the sides.

  3. Boil for 15 minutes to expel air from the jar.

  4. As the fruit shrinks, add more fruit from another vessel if needed.

Syrup, seal and store

  1. If desired, prepare a syrup with 1 quart of water and ½ pound of sugar, and pour it into the jar after cooking.

  2. Seal the jar or can tightly and store it in a cool place.

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. Pear + plumtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together245 recipes

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

  2. Peach + plumtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together163 recipes

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

  3. Peach + peartop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together114 recipes

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

  4. Pear + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,079 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

  5. Peach + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,308 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

What each ingredient does

Peaches
Make up the packed fruit, supplying most of the flavor and soft texture of the finished jar.
Pears
Make up the packed fruit, supplying mild sweetness and a tender texture.
Plums
Make up the packed fruit, adding tart, aromatic flavor and a juicy texture.
Berries
Make up the packed fruit, adding bright color and concentrated fruity flavor.
Sugar
Sweetens the optional syrup that is poured over the fruit.

The step that matters

Fill the jar completely and boil it to drive out air. Leaving no space and boiling the jar to expel air matters because trapped air can keep the lid from forming a tight seal. Fruit that shrinks also needs topping up so the jar stays full.

Swap the peach

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

  1. Apricotfits about as well
  2. Vanillafits about as well
  3. Peachthe original
  4. Applefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against pear, plum, sugar. 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.

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