Why it works: Sugar and white pepper work together. They rank in the top 42% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 812 recipes. The science ↓
To Dry Cherries the Best Way
Ingredients
Directions
Candy the cherries
Combine cherries and a small amount of water in a preserving pan, and heat until scalding hot.
Remove the cherries and dry them.
Layer the cherries back in the pan, sprinkling sugar between each layer.
Let the cherries sit to melt the sugar.
Heat the pan again until scalding hot.
Remove the cherries.
Repeat the layering and melting process two more times.
Dry and store
Drain the cherries from the syrup and lay them out singly on dishes to dry in the sun or on the stove.
Dip the cherries in cold water using a sieve.
Place them on a fine soft cloth to dry.
Set the cherries out again in the hot sun or on the stove.
Store the dried cherries in a box with layers of white pepper 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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Sugar + white peppertop 42% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together812 recipes
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Stoned cherries
- Provide the fruit that is candied, dried and becomes the final product.
- Double-refined sugar
- Penetrates the fruit in repeated layers, sweetening it and drawing out moisture as it dries.
- White pepper
- Packed between layers during storage, it is used here as a protective layer in the box.
The step that matters
Repeated sugar layering and melting. Sugar must dissolve fully into the fruit's syrup with each heating. Repeating the cycle draws water out of the cherries and builds up sugar, which preserves them. Rushing the cycle leaves the fruit wet and prone to spoiling.
“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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