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Dessert

Apple Jam

Apple jam made by stewing apples with sugar and lemon, then simmering and preserving.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,551 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Apple Jam

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the apples

  1. Peel, core, and slice the apples thinly, ensuring they are all the same variety.

  2. Place the apples in a jar.

  3. Stand the jar in a saucepan of boiling water.

  4. Let the apples stew until tender.

  5. Weigh the apples to determine the amount of sugar needed.

Make the jam

  1. Transfer the apples to a preserving pan.

  2. Crush the sugar into small lumps.

  3. Add the sugar along with the grated lemon rind and juice.

  4. Simmer the mixture over low heat for 1 hour, starting from when it begins to simmer.

  5. Remove any scum that rises.

Pot and seal

  1. Once done, pour the jam into pots.

  2. Place a piece of oiled paper over the jam.

  3. Cover with tissue paper dipped in egg white to seal.

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

Apples
Provide the bulk of the jam and, with their natural pectin, help it set.
Preserving sugar
Sweetens the jam and helps it set and keep well.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens flavour and supports pectin setting.

The step that matters

Simmering the sugar and fruit. Sugar and fruit must be cooked together long enough to reach the setting point. Undercooking leaves the jam runny, while overcooking can darken and dull its flavour.

Swap the lemon

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against apple, 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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