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Preserve

To Preserve Pine-apples

Pineapples preserved in sugar syrup, either whole over several days of repeated boiling or sliced and packed in jars.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Eliza Leslie · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Pine and apple work together. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 98 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

To Preserve Pine-apples

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pineapples

  1. Pare the fine large pineapples and cut a small round piece off the bottom of each, leaving the freshest top leaves on.

  2. On a slow fire, prepare a large preserving kettle with thin syrup barely sufficient to cover the fruit.

  3. For this syrup, allow a pound of fine loaf sugar to every quart of water and half the white of a beaten egg, mixing all before it goes on the fire.

Syrup and repeated boiling

  1. Boil and skim the syrup; when the scum stops rising, put in the pineapples and simmer them slowly an hour.

  2. Take them out to cool, cover them carefully, and pat them away till next day, saving the syrup in another vessel.

  3. Next day, put them into the same syrup and simmer them again an hour.

  4. On the third day, repeat the process.

  5. On the fourth day, make a strong fresh syrup allowing a pint of water to each pound of sugar and to every three pounds the beaten white of one egg.

  6. When this syrup has boiled and is completely skimmed, put in the pineapples and simmer them half an hour.

  7. Take them out to cool and set them aside till next morning.

  8. Boil them again half an hour in the same syrup, and repeat this for seven or eight days, or till a straw from a corn-broom pierces the pineapple.

  9. At the last boiling, enrich the syrup with a quarter pound more sugar to each pound of sugar.

  10. Having boiled and skimmed the syrup, put in the pineapples for half an hour.

  11. Take them out, and when quite cold put each into a separate glass jar and fill up with the syrup.

Sugar-and-water method

  1. Pare pineapples, cut them into round pieces near an inch thick, and remove the core from the centre of each slice.

  2. Allow a pound of loaf sugar to every pound of sliced pineapple; powder the sugar and strew it in layers between the slices.

  3. Cover and let it set all night.

  4. Next morning, measure clear spring or pump water, allowing half a pint to each pound of sugar.

  5. Beat the white of egg (one white to four pounds of sugar) to a very stiff froth, and stir it gradually into the water.

  6. Mix the pineapple and sugar with the water and put the whole into a preserving kettle.

  7. Boil and skim well till the pineapple is tender and bright all through.

  8. Take it out, and when cold, put it up in wide-mouthed glass jars or large tumblers.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

127Calories
6 gProtein
5 gFat
13 gCarbs

Counts 2 of 3 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 2 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Waternot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Eliza Leslie. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

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. See the original page.

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. Pine + appletop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Sugar + appletop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together16,478 recipes

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

  3. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + pinetop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together309 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Egg + appletop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,461 recipes

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

Sugar and apple barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 16,478 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

Sugar
Forms a thick syrup that preserves the fruit and gives it sweetness.
Egg white
When beaten and boiled, its proteins coagulate and rise, carrying scum that is skimmed off, clarifying the syrup.
Pineapple (in the method)
The fruit being preserved; it softens and turns clear as it absorbs the syrup.
Water
Dissolves the sugar into the syrup that cooks and penetrates the fruit.

The step that matters

Repeated boiling and cooling of the pineapples. Each brief simmer followed by cooling lets syrup slowly penetrate the fruit without breaking it down. Rushing this with one long boil would leave the pineapple tough or mushy.

Swap the apple

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

  1. Lemonfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, pine. 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.

More preserved pineapple recipes

Chips 3 See all 35 →

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