Why it works: Pineapple and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 19% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,841 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Pine-apple Jam
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Weigh the pineapples and the same weight of sugar.
Skin and remove the eyes from the pineapples, then cut them into thin slices.
Sprinkle half the sugar over the fruit and let it stand for 2 hours.
Make the jam
Boil the mixture for 30 minutes.
The next day, add the remaining sugar and boil for 1 hour.
Finish
Pour the jam into jars and stir gently with a wooden spoon.
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.
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Pineapple + sugartop 19% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together4,841 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Pineapples
- Supply the fruit, flavour and juice that the sugar draws out and cooks down into jam.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the jam, draws water out of the fruit and helps preserve it.
The step that matters
The second boil after adding the remaining sugar. The sugar must dissolve and water must evaporate for the jam to thicken. Boiling too briefly leaves it runny, while boiling too long can scorch the sugar and over-thicken the jam.
“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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