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Dessert

Jersey Pie

A fruit pie made with currants, raisins, sugar, molasses, spices, crackers, water, vinegar, lemon extract, butter, and eggs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Jersey Pie

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

  1. In a bowl, mix all the dry ingredients together.

  2. In another bowl, combine the fluids with the beaten eggs.

  3. Pour the fluid mixture over the dry ingredients and stir in the melted butter vigorously.

  4. Adjust the proportion of molasses to sugar as desired.

  5. For a richer flavor, add ½ pint of brandy.

Bake

  1. Bake like other mince pies.

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. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Mace + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Raisin + clovetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,070 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the filling and add structure as they set during baking.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, giving a tender texture to the filling.
Brown sugar and molasses
Provides sweetness and a deep, caramel-like flavor.
Crushed crackers or dry bread crumbs
Absorbs liquid and gives the filling body.
Currants
Add chewy texture and concentrated fruity sweetness.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (raisin, sugar, molasses, pepper, cinnamon, mace, clove):

  1. Figfits better
  2. Orangefits better
  3. Applefits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against raisin, sugar, molasses, pepper, cinnamon, mace, clove. 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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