Why it works: Wine and apple are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,207 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓
Jellied Apples
Ingredients
Directions
Cook the apples
Soak the gelatine in ½ cup of water for about 1 hour.
Combine 2 cups of sugar, 1 pint of water, ½ cup of wine, and the juice and grated peel of 1 lemon in a pot.
Boil the mixture for about 5 minutes.
Pare, core, and slice the apples.
Boil the sliced apples in the wine and water mixture until tender.
Carefully remove the tender apples from the pot.
Place the cooked apples on a platter.
Boil the remaining apples, ensuring they are not crowded.
Set the jelly
Remove the pot from the heat.
Stir in the dissolved gelatine.
Place the pot in a basin of cold ice water.
Stir the mixture until cold.
Gently mix in the apples.
Pour the mixture into a mold that has been wet with cold water.
Set the mold in a cold place to harden.
Unmold and serve
Turn the jellied apples onto a platter.
Serve with whipped cream and sugar.
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.
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Wine + appletop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,207 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
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Wine + lemontop 13% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together6,157 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Lemon + appletop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,551 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Sugar + appletop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together16,478 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together53,532 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sugar and apple barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 16,478 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
- Gelatine
- Sets the sweet liquid into a firm, sliceable jelly as it cools.
- Apples
- Provide the main fruit, firm texture and flavor once cooked until tender.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness that balances the wine and lemon.
- Wine
- Adds flavor and a little acidity to the cooking liquid.
- Lemon juice and peel
- Add bright acidity and aroma to the syrup.
The step that matters
Cooling before adding the apples. Gelatine sets as it cools, so the mixture must be stirred cold and just starting to thicken before the apples go in. If it is still warm, the apples can sink instead of staying evenly suspended in the jelly.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, wine, apple):
- Pearfits better
- Grapefits better
- Plumfits better
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, wine, apple. 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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