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Marmalade for the Charlotte

A marmalade made from boiled apples, butter, sugar, cinnamon, and lemon juice, used in a Charlotte.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,598 recipes. Both carry methyl cinnamate, which smells strawberry. The science ↓

Marmalade for the Charlotte

Ingredients

Directions

Make the marmalade

  1. Combine the apples, butter, sugar, cinnamon, and lemon juice in a stewpan.

  2. Cook over low heat, stirring often, until the mixture becomes a smooth and dry marmalade.

Cool

  1. Allow the marmalade to cool before using it in the crust.

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 + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,598 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  2. Cinnamon + lemontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,950 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Apple + lemontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,551 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Apple + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,706 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Boiling apples
Break down into pulp that thickens into a smooth marmalade.
Butter
Adds richness and a silky texture to the marmalade.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the marmalade and helps it thicken as it cooks down.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the sweet apple flavour.

The step that matters

Cooking the marmalade over low heat. Stirring often over low heat keeps the apples from scorching on the bottom of the pan while the water evaporates. Cooking slowly lets the mixture reduce to a smooth, dry consistency rather than a runny or burnt one.

Swap the lemon

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against apple, butter, sugar, cinnamon. 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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