Why it works: Gooseberry and sugar work together. They rank in the top 25% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 131 recipes. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓
Gooseberry Paste
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the pulp
Press the gooseberries through a sieve to extract the juice for jelly, leaving some moisture.
Weigh the pulp and boil it for about 1 hour and 15 minutes until it forms a dry paste.
Make the paste
Off the heat, stir in 1 ½ cups of sugar for each pound of fruit until nearly dissolved.
Return to heat and boil the mixture for 20 to 25 minutes, stirring constantly to prevent burning.
Set and serve
Pour the mixture into molds or shallow pans.
Let the paste cool before serving.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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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Gooseberry + sugartop 25% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together131 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
- Gooseberry pulp
- Provides the fruit body and natural pectin that help the paste set firm.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness, preserves the paste, and helps it thicken into a sliceable set.
The step that matters
Boiling the sugared mixture. Once the sugar is dissolved, the thick, sugar-rich mixture scorches easily on the bottom of the pan. Constant stirring spreads the heat evenly and prevents burnt flavour and dark specks.
“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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