Why it works: Currant and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 26% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 12,256 recipes. The science ↓
Cherry Marmalade
Ingredients
Directions
Make the marmalade
Pit the cherries and thoroughly mash them through a coarse sieve.
For every 3 pounds of cherry pulp, add 1 ½ cups of currant juice.
Add ¾ pound of sugar for each pound of fruit and mix well.
Boil the mixture until it reaches a jelly consistency.
Store
Pour into cans or glasses for storage.
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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Currant + sugartop 26% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together12,256 recipes
Currant and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,256 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
- Cherries
- Provide the bulk of the fruit, flavour and body for the marmalade.
- Currant juice
- Adds acidity and natural pectin, helping the marmalade set.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and, when boiled with fruit, helps the mixture thicken into a jelly.
The step that matters
Boil until a jelly consistency is reached. Sugar, pectin and acid form a gel only when the mixture is concentrated enough by boiling. Stopping early leaves it runny, while boiling too long can make it stiff and prone to scorching on the bottom of the pan.
“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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