Skip to main content
Dessert

To Preserve Quinces Whole

A method for preserving whole quinces in syrup and brandy paper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Quince and brandy work together. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 91 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

To Preserve Quinces Whole

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the quinces

  1. Pare the quinces very thin and round.

  2. Place them in a well-tinned saucepan with a new pewter spoon in the middle.

  3. Fill the saucepan with hard water and lay the parings over the quinces to keep them down.

  4. Cover the saucepan tightly and set it over a slow fire until the quinces are soft and a fine pink colour.

Make the syrup

  1. Let them cool, then make a syrup with double refined sugar, boiling and skimming it well.

  2. Add the quinces to the syrup and boil for ten minutes.

  3. Remove from heat and let them stand for two to three hours.

  4. Boil again until the syrup thickens and the quinces become clear.

Store

  1. Transfer the quinces to deep jars, cover with brandy papers and leather, and store in a dry 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. Quince + brandytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together91 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Sugar + brandytop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together11,939 recipes

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

  3. Quince + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,444 recipes

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

Sugar and brandy barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 11,939 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Quinces
Form the main body of the preserve, softening and turning pink when cooked slowly.
Double refined sugar
Sweetens the preserve and, as it thickens the syrup, helps preserve the fruit.
Hard water
Provides the cooking liquid in which the quinces soften gently.

The step that matters

Cooking the quinces slowly under a tight cover. Quinces are firm and need long, gentle cooking to soften through. A fast boil can break the fruit apart or toughen the outside before the centre is tender.

Swap the quince

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Apricotfits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Quincethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, brandy. 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.

You might also like

Quince JellyQuince Jelly131 recipesBrandy PeachesBrandy Peaches68 recipesBrandy CreamBrandy Cream21 recipesBrandy PuddingBrandy Pudding13 recipes