Name: Strawberries Preserved Whole
Ingredients: equal weights of strawberries and loaf sugar; sufficient water to dissolve the sugar; 1 pint red currant juice for each pound of strawberries

Why it works: Sugar and red currant are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 26% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,156 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Strawberries Preserved Whole

Ingredients

equal weights of strawberries and loaf sugar
sufficient water to dissolve the sugar
1 pint red currant juice for each pound of strawberries

Directions

Make the syrup

Combine equal weights of strawberries and loaf sugar in a pan.
Add just enough water to dissolve the sugar and bring to a boil until small bubbles form, about 20 minutes.

Cook and jar

Add the strawberries and 1 pint of red currant juice for each pound of strawberries.
Boil for 5 minutes, then transfer to small jars.

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.

Sugar + red curranttop 26% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,156 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Strawberries: Provide the fruit that is preserved whole and gives the dish its flavor.
Loaf sugar: Sweetens the dish and draws water out of the fruit, helping preserve it.
Red currant juice: Adds tartness and acidity to balance the sweetness of 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.