Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓
Pkeserved Pears
Ingredients
Directions
Pare and divide the pears, removing the cores but leaving the stems on.
Prepare a syrup by boiling sugar with water.
Add a small bag of spices, such as cinnamon and cloves, to the syrup.
Pour the syrup over the pears and let them simmer until tender.
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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Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together14,189 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
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Pear + cinnamontop 4% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together600 recipes
Shared aroma: anethole (sweet, anise).
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Pear + clovetop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together512 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).
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Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together30,779 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Pear + sugartop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,079 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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
Swap the pear
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, cinnamon, clove):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Quincefits better
- Pearthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cinnamon, clove. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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