Why it works: Apricot and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,630 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Apricot Jam
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the fruit
Pare and halve the apricots, removing the stones.
Place them in a deep dish and sprinkle with 1 pound of sugar.
Let them sit for 8 hours to release syrup.
Transfer the apricots and syrup to a preserving pan.
Cook and jar
Add 1½ pounds of sugar and optional sliced kernels.
Boil gently until done.
Pour into glasses or jars and cover tightly with gummed paper.
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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Apricot + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together3,630 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Fresh apricots
- Provide the fruit, pectin and tartness that form the jam's body and flavour.
- Sugar
- Draws out juice and syrup, sweetens the jam, and helps it set and keep.
- Apricot kernels
- Add a subtle almond-like aroma when blanched and sliced into the jam.
The step that matters
Boil gently until done. Boiling too hard or too briefly changes the set. Gentle boiling thickens the syrup by evaporation while protecting the fruit's flavour and colour, and the jam sets as the sugar and pectin concentrate.
“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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