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Preserve

Canning Peaches

A method for preserving peaches in syrup for long-term storage.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Peach and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 280 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Canning Peaches

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the peaches

  1. Pour boiling water over the peaches to loosen the skins.

  2. Remove the skins and cut the peaches in halves.

  3. Drop the peach halves into cold water to prevent browning.

Make the syrup and cook

  1. In a preserving kettle, combine sugar and water, then add cloves and lemon rind.

  2. Bring the syrup to a boil and cook the peaches until soft.

  3. Remove the cloves and peach stones from the syrup.

Pack and seal

  1. Pack the peaches tightly in hot sterilized jars and pour the boiling syrup over them.

  2. Screw the lids on securely.

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. Peach + clovetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together280 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Clove + lemontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,150 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Peach + lemontop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together947 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Peach + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,308 recipes

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

  5. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Peaches
Provide the fruit, which softens and holds its shape in the hot syrup.
Sugar
Sweetens the fruit and, dissolved in water, forms the preserving syrup.

The step that matters

Drop the peach halves into cold water. Cut peach flesh oxidizes and turns brown quickly when exposed to air. Cold water slows this browning, keeping the fruit looking pale and fresh before it is cooked in the syrup.

Swap the clove

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Gingerfits better
  3. Peppermintfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against peach, sugar, lemon. 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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