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Dessert

Apple Relish

Apple relish is a cooked mixture of diced apples, sugar, raisins, pecans, and oranges.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and orange match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,230 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Apple Relish

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Combine diced apples, sugar, raisins, and chopped oranges in a pot.

  2. Cook over medium heat for 1 hour.

  3. Add pecans 5 minutes before removing from heat.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

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.

  1. Apple + orangetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,230 recipes

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

  2. Raisin + orangetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,684 recipes

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

  3. Apple + raisintop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,920 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + raisintop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,481 recipes

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

  5. Raisin + pecanstop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together139 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Apples
Provide bulk and tart fruit flavor, and their pectin helps the relish thicken as it cooks.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and, with the fruit, helps preserve the relish and thicken it as it cooks down.
Raisins
Add concentrated sweetness and chewy texture as they soften in the cooking fruit.
Pecans
Add crunch and a toasty, nutty flavor that contrasts with the soft fruit.

The step that matters

Add pecans 5 minutes before removing from heat. Pecans added too early soften and lose their crunch during the long simmer. Adding them near the end keeps some texture and fresh nutty flavor in the finished relish.

Swap the pecans

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (apple, sugar, raisin, orange):

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Chestnutfits better
  3. Pistachiofits better
  4. Pecansthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against apple, sugar, raisin, orange. 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.

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