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Watermel Rind Preserves

Preserves watermelon rind in a sweet syrup with optional mace or ginger.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and mace are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 34% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,096 recipes. The science ↓

Watermel Rind Preserves

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the rind

  1. Line the bottom and sides of a kettle with vine leaves.

  2. Layer watermelon rind and vine leaves, adding a small pinch of alum in each layer.

  3. Cover with more leaves, a wet towel, and enough water to submerge the layers.

  4. Simmer for 1 hour.

  5. Remove the rind and place it on a dish.

Make the syrup

  1. In a separate pot, combine 1 pound of sugar and 1 pint of water to make a syrup.

  2. Once the scum has settled, add the rind and simmer for 30 minutes.

  3. Remove the rind again and let the syrup simmer for 1 hour.

  4. Return the rind to the syrup and simmer for another 30 minutes.

  5. Let it stand overnight, then pour off the syrup.

Finish and jar

  1. Boil the syrup until thick like honey and pour it over the rind in a jar.

  2. Season with mace or ginger if desired.

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. Sugar + macetop 34% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,096 recipes

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

What each ingredient does

Watermelon rind
Forms the bulk of the preserve and absorbs the sugar syrup as it cooks.
Sugar
Sweetens the preserve and, once thickened, gives it a syrupy body and preserving quality.
Alum
Helps the rind stay firm and crisp during long simmering.
Vine leaves
Lines and separates the layers so the rind cooks evenly without sticking to the kettle.

The step that matters

Boil the syrup until thick like honey. Reducing the syrup concentrates the sugar so it coats the rind and helps preserve it. Stopping too early leaves a thin, watery syrup that spoils more easily.

“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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