Name: Orange Jelly
Ingredients: one quart water; half pounds sugar; one quart of milk; two cups sugar; one-half cup of the water; one dozen fine oranges by taking off the skins; one two-ounce package of coxe's gela- tine in as little water as will thoroughly; three eggs; one small cup of sugar; four lemons; four eggs; one-half pack- age gelatine; one good pint cold water; 36 gems

Why it works: Orange and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

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.

Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together10,634 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together19,053 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk + orangetop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,696 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together53,532 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together88,785 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Gelatin: Sets the liquid into a firm, sliceable jelly as it cools.
Sugar: Sweetens the syrup and adds body to the jelly.
Oranges: Provide the main flavour and pieces of fruit suspended in the jelly.

The step that matters

Remove all the tough fibre from the oranges. Leftover white pith and membrane can taste bitter and make the jelly less clean in flavour. Removing it before the pieces go into the set mixture keeps the flavour bright and the texture pleasant.

Swap the orange

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

Vanillafits better
Orangethe original
Figfits about as well
Blueberryfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, milk, egg, lemon. 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.

Ingredient	Portion assumed	kcal
Milk	1 cup (244ml) whole	149
Egg	1 large egg (50g)	78
Orange	1 medium (131g)	62
Sugar	1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated	49
Lemon	juice of 1 lemon (48ml)	12
Water	not in our table	0

Orange Jelly

Orange Jelly

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the oranges

Make the jelly

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)