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Dessert

Pineapple Jelly

A gelatin dessert made with pineapple, sugar, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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Pineapple Jelly

Why it works: Sugar and gelatin are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,778 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Pineapple Jelly

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the gelatin in cold water for 1 hour.

Make the jelly

  1. Add boiling water, sugar, and pineapple pulp.

  2. Bring to a boil, then strain into a mold.

  3. Set the mold on ice to cool.

Unmold

  1. To unmold, wrap a cloth dipped in hot water around the mold for a few moments. It will slip out easily.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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 + gelatintop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,778 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Pineapple + gelatintop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together282 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  3. Sugar + pineappletop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,841 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Gelatin
Sets the liquid into a firm jelly that holds its shape when unmolded.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the tartness of the pineapple.
Pineapple
Provides the fruity aroma and tart flavor of the jelly.

The step that matters

Warming the mold to unmold. Only a brief warm cloth is needed. Prolonged heat melts the gelatin at the surface, which can soften the jelly and make it lose its shape.

Swap the pineapple

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Pineapplethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, gelatin. 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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