Skip to main content
Dessert

Preserved Crab Apple

Preserved crab apples are cooked with sugar and brandy, then sealed in bottles.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Apple and brandy are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,291 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Preserved Crab Apple

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the syrup

  1. Peel the apples and place them in cold water.

  2. Put the apple peelings in a preserving kettle, cover with cold water, and simmer for about 1 hour.

  3. Strain the water and return it to the kettle.

Cook and bottle

  1. Add an equal weight of sugar to the fruit and cook until the syrup thickens.

  2. Drop in a few apples at a time and cook until tender enough to pierce with a fork.

  3. Carefully lift the apples out and place them in glass bottles.

  4. Cook the syrup a little longer, pour it over the apples, add 1 teaspoon of brandy, and seal the bottles.

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. Apple + brandytop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,291 recipes

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

  2. Apple + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together16,478 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + brandytop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together11,939 recipes

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

Apple and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 16,478 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

Apples
Provide the main fruit that softens and holds its shape in the syrup.
Sugar
Thickens the syrup and preserves the fruit by drawing out water.
Brandy
Adds aroma and helps preserve the finished fruit.

The step that matters

Cooking the apples until just tender. Apples cooked too long lose their shape and turn mushy, while undercooked fruit stays firm and fails to absorb syrup. Testing with a fork shows when the flesh has softened enough.

Swap the apple

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Apricotfits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, brandy. 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

Apple PuddingApple Pudding256 recipesApple CakeApple Cake80 recipesApple MeringueApple Meringue75 recipesBrandy PeachesBrandy Peaches68 recipes