Name: Stuffed Prunes
Ingredients: 1 pound prunes; 1 cup raisins; 1 cup walnuts; candied cherries; stiff orange marmalade

Why it works: Walnut and orange are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,058 recipes. Both carry 2,4-nonadienal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Stuffed Prunes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Steam the prunes and remove the stones.

Stuff the prunes

Stuff some prunes with another prune.
Stuff others with chopped nuts.
For a variation, stuff prunes with a mixture of raisins, walnuts, and a few candied cherries.
Alternatively, stuff prunes with stiff orange marmalade.

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.

Walnut + orangetop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,058 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).
Raisin + orangetop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,684 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Raisin + walnuttop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together647 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

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

What each ingredient does

Prunes: Form the main body of the dish and provide moisture and natural sweetness.
Walnuts: Add crunch and a rich, slightly bitter contrast to the soft prune.
Raisins: Add chewy texture and concentrated sweetness to the filling.
Stiff orange marmalade: Adds sweetness, acidity and citrus aroma to the filling.