Why it works: Plum and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,313 recipes. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓
To Preserve Fruit for Tarts, or Family Desserts
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Gather ripe cherries, plums, or American apples.
Place them in jars that hold 1 pound each.
Sprinkle 6 ounces of pounded sugar over each jar.
Cover each jar with 2 bladders, tied down separately.
Cook and store
Set the jars in a large stew pan filled with water up to the neck.
Boil gently for 3 hours.
Store the jars in a dry place.
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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Plum + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,313 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Ripe cherries, plums, or american apples
- Provide the fruit that is preserved, supplying flavor and the body of the finished filling.
- Loaf sugar
- Sweetens the fruit and draws out moisture, helping it keep its shape and preserve.
The step that matters
Boil gently for 3 hours. A gentle simmer heats the jars evenly without violent bubbling, which could crack jars or break up the fruit. Keeping the water level up to the necks maintains steady heat around the sealed jars.
“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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