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Magnum Bonum Plums

Plums simmered gently in a thin syrup and then boiled in fresh syrup until tender.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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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 ↓

Magnum Bonum Plums

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the plums

  1. Prick the plums with a needle to prevent bursting.

Simmer and cool

  1. Simmer the plums gently in a thin syrup.

  2. Transfer the plums to a china bowl and let them cool.

Make the syrup and finish

  1. Prepare a syrup with 3 pounds of sugar and just enough water to moisten the sugar.

  2. Boil the plums in the fresh syrup until tender.

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. Plum + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked 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

Magnum bonum plums
Form the fruit that softens in syrup while holding its shape during gentle cooking.
Sugar
Sweetens the fruit and forms the syrup the plums cook and soak in.

The step that matters

Prick the plums before cooking. Pricking lets steam escape and syrup penetrate the flesh, so the skins are less likely to split or burst as the fruit heats.

“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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