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Dessert

Quince Preserve

A sweet preserve made from quinces, sugar, water, and lemon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Quince and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 336 recipes. Both carry trans-2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Quince Preserve

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Pare, core, and quarter the quinces, then weigh them.

  2. In a preserving kettle, cover the cores with water and boil for 30 minutes.

  3. Strain the liquid through a fine sieve and return the juice to the kettle.

Cook the quinces

  1. Add the quinces a little at a time.

  2. Boil until tender.

  3. Remove with a drainer.

  4. If the liquid is low, add more water.

  5. Add the sugar.

  6. Boil for 10 minutes.

  7. Add the quinces back in.

  8. Boil for about 1 hour and 15 minutes on low heat.

  9. Slip a silver spoon under the quinces occasionally, and do not stir.

  10. Slice the lemons thinly.

  11. Place a slice or two in each jar when filling.

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. Quince + lemontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together336 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

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

  3. Quince + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,444 recipes

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

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

Quinces
Provide the fruit body and pectin-rich flesh that gives the preserve its structure and set.
White sugar
Adds sweetness and, with the cooking, helps the fruit thicken and preserve.
Lemons
Add acidity and a bright flavour that balances the sweetness.

The step that matters

Do not stir the quinces during the long simmer. Stirring breaks the tender quince pieces apart and makes the preserve cloudy and mushy. Occasionally sliding a spoon under them lets the fruit cook evenly without damage.

Swap the quince

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

  1. Orangefits better
  2. Limefits better
  3. Vanillafits better
  4. Quincethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against 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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