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Dessert

Paradise Hash

A fruit salad made with orange shells filled with sliced oranges, bananas, pineapple, and sweetened to taste.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Banana and pineapple match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 733 recipes. Both carry ethyl isobutyrate, which smells fruity, ethereal. The science ↓

Paradise Hash

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Slice off the top of each orange and scoop out the inside into a bowl, being careful not to break the skin.

  2. Cut the bananas and pineapple into small pieces.

Assemble and serve

  1. Combine all the fruit in the bowl and sweeten to taste.

  2. Fill the orange shells with the fruit mixture and serve with a spoon.

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. Banana + pineappletop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together733 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

  2. Orange + pineappletop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,664 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

  3. Orange + bananatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,118 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  4. Pineapple + sugartop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,841 recipes

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

  5. Banana + sugartop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,102 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Oranges
Their shells act as edible serving cups, and their juice adds moisture and bright acidity.
Bananas
Their soft flesh adds body and natural sweetness to the fruit mixture.
Pineapple
Its juice and acidity add brightness and moisture to the filling.

The step that matters

Scooping out the oranges. Cutting too deep or piercing the peel breaks the shell, so it cannot hold the filling. Working slowly with a spoon or knife keeps the rind intact.

Swap the orange

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Strawberryfits better
  3. Pearfits better
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against banana, pineapple, sugar. 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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