Why it works: Plum and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,313 recipes. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓
Plum Jelly
Ingredients
Directions
Extract the juice
Boil the plums in a little water until soft.
Strain the mixture through a jelly bag to extract the juice.
Make the jelly
Add 1 pound of sugar to 1 pint of the plum juice.
Boil the mixture for 20 minutes.
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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Plum + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,313 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Plums
- Provide the fruit flavor and natural pectin that helps the jelly set.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and, when boiled with the juice, helps the jelly set firm.
The step that matters
Boil the sugar and juice for 20 minutes. Boiling concentrates the sugar and pectin in the juice. Too little boiling leaves the jelly runny, while too much can make it stiff, so the timing matters for a proper set.
“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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