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To Preserve Quinces White

A method for preserving quince in syrup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 122,807 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

To Preserve Quinces White

Ingredients

Directions

Make the syrup

  1. Combine sugar, water, egg whites and shells in a pot. Boil and skim until clear.

Prepare the quinces

  1. Place quinces in cold water and simmer until tender. Let cool slightly.

  2. Peel quinces with a sharp knife, cut into quarters, and remove the core and any bruised parts.

Cook and preserve

  1. In a preserving pan, add quinces and enough syrup to cover them, accounting for evaporation.

  2. Cover the pan until boiling, then uncover and skim constantly until quinces are transparent.

  3. Pour a little syrup into the bottom of a jar, add a slice of quince, then more syrup, repeating until the jar is nearly full.

  4. Boil the remaining syrup the next day and pour it over the quinces.

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. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  2. Sugar + quincetop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,444 recipes

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

  3. Egg + quincetop 33% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together222 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptenal (green).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Loaf sugar
Forms the syrup that preserves the quince and makes it sweet and glossy.
Egg whites and shells
Bind impurities in the boiling syrup so they can be skimmed off, leaving it clear.
Quinces
The fruit being preserved; simmering softens it and syrup turns it transparent.

The step that matters

Skimming the syrup while cooking the quinces. Constant skimming removes foam and impurities as the syrup concentrates, keeping it clear and stopping scum from clouding the fruit. Cooking gently until the quince turns transparent shows the sugar has fully penetrated the fruit.

Swap the quince

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Lemonfits better
  4. Quincethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg. 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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