Why it works: Apple and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,478 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓
Apple-jelly
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the apples
Wipe the apples with a wet cloth, quarter them, and remove the cores.
Place the apples in a saucepan with the cold water and simmer gently for 30 minutes.
Set a sieve over an earthen bowl and pour the apples into the sieve without breaking them to let the juice drain.
Use the apples for sauce after sweetening them slightly.
Make the jelly
Strain the apple juice and add 1 pound of sugar for each pint of juice.
Put the juice and sugar into a preserving kettle and heat gradually.
Once the jelly begins to boil, boil for 10 minutes, then cool in glasses or molds.
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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Apple + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together16,478 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Apple and sugar 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
- Apples
- Provide the pectin and acid that let the juice set into a jelly.
- White sugar
- Sweetens the jelly and helps it set firm and hold its shape.
- Cold water
- Covers the apples so they simmer gently and release their juice.
The step that matters
Letting the juice drain without pressing. Pressing or squeezing the apples forces cloudy solids and pulp through the sieve, making the jelly cloudy and less clear. Draining slowly keeps the juice clear.
“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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