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Dessert

Wild Plum Preserves

Preserves made from wild plums, sugar, baking soda, and water, cooked until the syrup thickens to molasses consistency.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 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 ↓

Wild Plum Preserves

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the plums

  1. Scald the plums in a solution of saleratus-water until the skins begin to break.

  2. Drain the plums and remove the pits.

Make the syrup

  1. Weigh the plums and add an equal weight of sugar.

  2. Add a little water and bring to a boil, skimming off any foam.

  3. Add the plums and cook until tender, then remove the plums.

  4. Boil the syrup down until it thickens to the consistency of molasses and pour over the plums.

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

Wild plums
Provide the fruit, which softens and holds its shape during cooking to form the preserve.
Sugar
Sweetens the fruit and, as it thickens into syrup, preserves the plums and gives body.
Saleratus (baking soda)
Alkaline solution that softens the skins so they begin to break during scalding.

The step that matters

Boiling the syrup down. Sugar syrup thickens as water evaporates and concentrates, and it must reach a molasses-like consistency to set the preserve properly. Stopping too early leaves it thin and runny, while over-boiling can scorch the sugar.

“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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