Why it works: Quince and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,444 recipes. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓
Quince Marmalade
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the fruit
Pare, core and quarter the quinces.
Boil them gently in water until they begin to soften.
Make the marmalade
Strain through a fine sieve and beat to a pulp.
For each pound of fruit, add ¾ pound of fine sugar.
Boil until the marmalade is stiff.
Pot
Put the marmalade in pots.
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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Quince + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,444 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
- Quinces
- Provide the fruit pulp and natural pectin that help the marmalade set.
- Fine sugar
- Sweetens the fruit and, when concentrated by boiling, helps the marmalade set and keep.
The step that matters
Boil until the marmalade is stiff. Sugar and pectin form a gel only when enough water has evaporated and the mixture reaches the right concentration. Stopping too early leaves a runny marmalade, while boiling too long can make it hard and dull in flavour.
“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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