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Fig Filling

A sweet fig filling made by cooking figs with water, sugar, and vanilla until spreadable.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Fig Filling

Why it works: Fig and vanilla match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 324 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Fig Filling

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Chop the figs finely.

  2. Cook the figs in water until tender.

  3. Add the sugar and cook until the mixture reaches a spreadable consistency.

  4. Stir in the vanilla.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Fig + vanillatop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together324 recipes

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

  2. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  3. Fig + sugartop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,241 recipes

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

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Figs
Provide the bulk, body and natural fruit flavour of the filling.
Sugar
Sweetens the filling and helps it thicken into a spreadable texture as it cooks.
Vanilla
Adds aroma that rounds out the sweetness of the figs.

The step that matters

Cooking after adding the sugar. Sugar raises the boiling point and thickens the fruit as water evaporates. Cooking too briefly leaves the filling runny, while cooking too long makes it stiff and sticky once it cools, so check the consistency rather than the clock.

Swap the fig

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

  1. Figthe original
  2. Blueberryfits about as well
  3. Peachfits about as well
  4. Bananafits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, vanilla. 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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