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Dessert

Mixed Marmalade

A marmalade made from equal parts white apples, yellow pears, and white plums, sweetened with sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Pear and plum match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 245 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Mixed Marmalade

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fruit

  1. Peel and cut the apples, pears, and plums into small bits.

  2. Stew the fruit in a little water until tender, then strain through a fine sieve.

  3. Weigh the pulp and add an equal weight of sugar.

Cook the marmalade

  1. Cook the mixture in a thick-lined granite kettle on the stove for three hours.

  2. Stir often for the first two hours and continuously for the last hour to prevent burning.

  3. When thick, pour into shallow pans and cover.

Serve

  1. To serve, slice and place on a plate like cheese.

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 + plumtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together245 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Apple + peartop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together649 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, fruity).

  3. Apple + plumtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together404 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Pear + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,079 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

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

White apples
Provide natural pectin and body that helps the marmalade thicken as it cooks.
Yellow pears
Add soft fruit pulp and mild sweetness, adding bulk to the set marmalade.
White plums
Contribute fruit pulp and acidity that balances the sugar in the finished spread.
Sugar
Sweetens the fruit and, as it concentrates, helps the marmalade set firm and keep.

The step that matters

Stirring during the long cook. The mixture is thick and sugary, so it scorches easily on the bottom of the kettle. Frequent stirring, and constant stirring in the final hour as it thickens, prevents burning and keeps the flavour clean.

Swap the plum

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

  1. Plumthe original
  2. Apricotfits about as well
  3. Vanillafits about as well
  4. Quincefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against apple, pear, sugar. 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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