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Dessert

Pears, Preserved

A method of preserving pears by stewing them with sugar, lemon, ginger, and optional cochineal.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and ginger match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,154 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Pears, Preserved

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pears

  1. Gather pears before they are fully ripe.

  2. Pare, halve, and core the pears.

  3. Weigh the pears and place them in a deep jar.

  4. Add 3 pounds of sugar for every 4 pounds of pears and just enough water to moisten the sugar.

  5. Add the lemon juice, lemon rind, and ginger for every 2 pounds of pears.

Cook and store

  1. Place the jar in a saucepan of boiling water and steam gently for 6-7 hours.

  2. Transfer the pears into jars.

  3. Secure the lids.

  4. Store in a cool, dry place.

  5. Optionally, add 2-3 drops of cochineal after cooking to enhance appearance.

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. Lemon + gingertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,154 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Pear + gingertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together452 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Pear + lemontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together942 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  4. Sugar + gingertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together14,054 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

  5. Pear + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,079 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

Sugar and ginger barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 14,054 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

Pears
Provide the bulk of the preserve and soften into tender pieces during long, gentle steaming.
Sugar
Draws moisture out of the fruit and acts as a preservative, giving the preserve its sweetness and body.
Lemon
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour and helps balance the sweetness of the sugar.

The step that matters

Steam gently for 6-7 hours. Steaming gently and steadily keeps the pears whole and tender while the sugar slowly penetrates the fruit. Vigorous boiling can break the pears apart and make the texture mushy.

Swap the pear

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

  1. Orangefits better
  2. Limefits better
  3. Mangofits about as well
  4. Pearthe original

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