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Pears, Baked

Pears baked with sugar, cloves, and lemon peel, optionally stewed in molasses.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Pear and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 512 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Pears, Baked

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Peel and halve the pears, removing the cores.

Cook

  1. Place pears in a pan with cloves, sugar, and enough water to cover.

  2. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven until tender.

  3. Transfer to a slow fire to stew gently.

  4. Add grated lemon peel and more sugar if needed.

Alternative method

  1. Alternatively, bake in a tin with ½ cup molasses or sugar and ½ cup water.

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. Pear + clovetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together512 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Clove + lemontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,150 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Pear + lemontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together942 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  5. Clove + molassestop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,483 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Pears
Softens into tender, sweet flesh as it bakes and stews.
Sugar
Sweetens the fruit and helps form a syrup as the pears cook.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, deeper color and a rich, caramel-like flavor.
Grated lemon peel
Adds a bright aroma that balances the sweetness.

The step that matters

Stew gently over a slow fire. Gentle heat lets the pears soften evenly while holding their shape. A hard boil can break the flesh down into mush and toughen the outer layers before the centers become tender.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Applefits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pear, sugar, clove, molasses. 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.

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