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Dessert

Mussel Plum Cheese and Jellt

A plum preserve made by boiling plums, adding sugar, and setting into molds, with a cheese variant boiled with powdered sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 2 ingredients
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Why it works: Plum and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,313 recipes. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓

Mussel Plum Cheese and Jellt

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the plums

  1. Fill large stone jars with ripe, dry, and sound plums.

  2. Place jars in an oven that has been off for several hours.

  3. Boil plums gently in water until tender.

  4. Strain the juice from the plums.

  5. Weigh the juice.

Make the jelly

  1. Boil the juice rapidly for 25 minutes.

  2. Add 3 lbs of sugar to the juice. Stir until dissolved.

  3. Continue boiling for 10 minutes. Remove any scum.

  4. Pour the preserve into small molds or pans. Let it set.

Make the cheese

  1. Skin and stone the plums for the cheese variant.

  2. Boil them for 1 hour and 15 minutes, stirring constantly.

  3. Add 1 lb of powdered sugar to 3 lbs of fruit. Boil for another 30 minutes.

  4. Press the mixture into shallow pans or molds.

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. Plum + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,313 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

Plums
Provide the fruit, pectin and tartness that set the jelly and form the cheese.
Sugar
Sweetens the preserve and, when boiled down, helps it thicken and set firmly.

The step that matters

Remove any scum. Scum rising during the boil is impurities and foam from the fruit. Skimming it keeps the jelly clear and prevents off flavours in the finished set.

“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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