Skip to main content
Dessert

Spiced Cherries

A preserve of cherries steeped in a spiced vinegar and sugar syrup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Clove and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Spiced Cherries

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the syrup

  1. In a pot, combine vinegar, brown sugar, cloves, cinnamon, and mace in a spice bag.

  2. Boil the mixture until the sugar dissolves.

Steep the cherries

  1. Pour the hot mixture over the cherries.

  2. Let the cherries sit for 3 days.

  3. Drain the liquid and boil it down slightly.

  4. Repeat the pouring process for 3 to 5 days, pouring the hot liquid over the cherries each time.

  5. Seal the cherries in an airtight container.

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. Clove + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Clove + macetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  3. Cinnamon + macetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  4. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Cherries
Provide the fruit that is flavored and preserved by the spiced vinegar syrup.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and body to the syrup and helps balance the vinegar's acidity.
Vinegar
Acts as the preserving liquid and adds sharp acidity that balances the sweetness.
Cloves
Contribute warm, aromatic spice flavor to the syrup.
Cinnamon
Contributes warm, sweet spice aroma to the syrup.

The step that matters

Repeating the hot pour over 3 to 5 days. Pouring the hot liquid over the cherries repeatedly lets heat and the spiced syrup gradually penetrate the fruit. Reboiling the liquid each time keeps it hot enough to help the cherries absorb flavor and stay preserved before sealing.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Allspicefits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Cardamomfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, vinegar, clove, cinnamon. 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.

You might also like

Cinnamon RollsCinnamon Rolls71 recipesClove CakeClove Cake53 recipesCinnamon CakeCinnamon Cake42 recipesWhite CakeWhite Cake431 recipes