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Orange Marmalade

A preserve made from grated Seville orange rinds, pulp, juice, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Orange and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Orange Marmalade

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the rinds

  1. Grate the rinds of Seville oranges.

  2. Cut the grated rinds into quarters, removing the flesh and pips.

  3. Soak the rinds in cold water overnight.

  4. Boil the rinds for 20 minutes and drain.

  5. Slice the rinds thinly.

Make the marmalade

  1. Combine the sliced rinds with 8 ounces of rinds for each pound of pulp and juice, along with 1½ pounds of powdered sugar.

  2. Boil the mixture quickly for 30 minutes, skimming as needed.

Finish and jar

  1. Pour the mixture into jars.

  2. Leave some fruit ungrated.

  3. Mix in additional grated zest.

  4. Adjust sugar accordingly.

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. Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  2. Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  3. Orange + sugartop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,212 recipes

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

Lemon and sugar 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

Seville oranges
Their peel and pith supply pectin for setting and the bitter flavour that defines marmalade.
Lemons
Add pectin and acidity, which help the marmalade set and keep its flavour bright.
Sifted sugar
Sweetens the marmalade and, at high concentration, helps it set into a gel.

The step that matters

Boil the mixture quickly for 30 minutes. Sugar and pectin only form a gel when the mixture reaches a high enough concentration and temperature. A weak boil can leave the marmalade runny, while overcooking can make it stiff. Skimming removes foam so the finished preserve stays clear.

“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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