Why it works: Sugar and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 53,532 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Blackberry Jam
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Pick over the blackberries, removing stalks and unripe ones.
Cook
Combine the blackberries, sugar, and lemon juice in a pan.
Boil for about 1 hour, or until the fruit is done.
Jar and store
Cool and transfer to jars for storage.
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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Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together53,532 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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
- Blackberries
- Provide the fruit body, flavour, and natural pectin that help the jam thicken.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the jam and, as it concentrates, helps it set and keeps it preserved.
- Lemon juice
- Adds acidity that brightens the flavour and helps pectin form a gel.
The step that matters
Boiling until the fruit is done. Jam sets as water evaporates and sugar and pectin concentrate. Stopping too early leaves it runny, while boiling too long can make it dull and overly stiff.
“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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