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Dessert

Apples in Red Jelly

Apples stewed in a sweet red jelly made with sugar, gelatin, lemon rind, cloves, and cochineal.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and clove are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,774 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Apples in Red Jelly

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the apples

  1. Peel and core the apples.

  2. Place them in a large stewpan and pour over the boiling water with dissolved loaf sugar.

Stew and glaze

  1. Add the lemon rind and cloves, cover, and stew gently until the apples are tender.

  2. Remove the apples, brush the tops with egg white, and sprinkle with castor sugar.

Make the red jelly and set

  1. Add the gelatine to the stewpan contents, stir until dissolved, then strain into a basin.

  2. Color the mixture red with cochineal.

  3. Place the apples in a deep glass dish, pour the syrup around them, and set aside in a cool place until set.

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. Apple + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,774 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Lemon + clovetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,150 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Apple + lemontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,551 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Apple + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together16,478 recipes

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

  5. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

Apple and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 16,478 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

Apples
Provide the fruit body that becomes tender when stewed and is held in the jelly.
Loaf sugar
Sweetens the syrup and helps give the jelly its body.
Leaf gelatine
Sets the strained syrup into a clear, firm jelly around the apples.
Egg white
Brushed on the apple tops to form a glaze that helps the sugar adhere.
Cloves
Add warm aroma to the syrup as the apples stew.

The step that matters

Dissolving the gelatine and straining before it sets. Gelatine must be fully dissolved in the hot syrup, or it will leave specks and uneven setting. Straining removes any undissolved particles and debris so the jelly sets clear and smooth.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (apple, sugar, lemon, egg):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Gingerfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against apple, sugar, lemon, egg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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