Name: Canned Fruits and Vegetables
Ingredients: Fresh fruit (cherries, pears, raspberries, pineapple, blackberries, currants, plums, grapes, whortleberries, tomatoes, peaches, gooseberries, quinces); Syrup or hot water

Why it works: Pear and plum match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 245 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Canned Fruits and Vegetables

Ingredients

Fresh fruit (cherries, pears, raspberries, pineapple, blackberries, currants, plums, grapes, whortleberries, tomatoes, peaches, gooseberries, quinces)
Syrup or hot water

Directions

Select perfectly fresh and sound fruit, carefully pick over to avoid any ill flavor.
Prepare a very wet hot cloth in a pan and rinse jars in hot and then cold water.
Place a silver spoon in the jar, add a cup of syrup, and fill with fruit to the top.
Remove the spoon and cover the fruit with syrup.
Let the contents cool for 10-15 minutes, then fill to the top with syrup or hot water.
Seal the jar and tighten the top once cooled, then store in a cool, dark place.

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.

Pear + plumtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together245 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Plum + peachtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together163 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Pear + quincetop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together133 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).
Pear + peachtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together114 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Plum + quincetop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together92 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pear, pineapple, plum, grape, tomato, peach, quince):

Apricotfits better
Applefits better
Cherryfits better
Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pear, pineapple, plum, grape, tomato, peach, quince. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.