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Creams, Jellies, &C

A jelly made with clear calf's‑foot gelatin, sweet wine, lemon juice, sugar, egg whites, peaches, grapes, and vine leaves.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Peach and grape match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 218 recipes. Both carry 2,6-nonadienal, which smells cucumber, green. The science ↓

Creams, Jellies, &C

Ingredients

Directions

Make the jelly

  1. Strain the mixture.

  2. Let it cool.

  3. Melt it again.

  4. Add a bit of orange and lemon peel for color.

  5. Skim well.

  6. Mix in sweet wine, lemon juice, and sugar.

  7. Adjust sweetness to taste.

  8. Whisk the egg whites.

  9. Stir them into the mixture.

  10. Boil briefly.

  11. Add more lemon juice.

  12. Pour into a jelly bag with egg whites.

  13. If not clear, repeat the process.

  14. Hang the bag near a fire until all the jelly runs through.

  15. Test if the mixture will jelly.

  16. Cool a spoonful while on the fire.

Assemble and set

  1. Place ½ pint of jelly in a bowl.

  2. Add peaches and grapes.

  3. Cover with vine leaves.

  4. Fill with jelly.

  5. Let it set overnight.

  6. Warm the bowl in hot water to release the jelly.

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. Peach + grapetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together218 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

  2. Wine + grapetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together819 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-p-menthene-8-thiol (grapefruit).

  3. Lemon + peachtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together947 recipes

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

  4. Wine + lemontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,157 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Wine + peachtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together218 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg whites
Whisked whites are stirred in and then clarify the jelly as it is strained through the bag.
Sugar
Sweetens the jelly and helps give it body and a clear, set texture.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour and balances the sweetness of the wine and sugar.
Calf's-foot jelly
Provides the gelatin that lets the liquid set into a firm jelly once cooled.
Sweet wine
Adds flavour and liquid to the jelly base.
Peaches
Provide fruit flavour and body within the set jelly.

The step that matters

Clarifying the jelly through the egg whites. Egg whites coagulate when heated and trap cloudy particles as they set, so the jelly runs clear through the bag. Skipping the boil or hanging too early leaves the jelly cloudy.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (wine, sugar, egg, peach, grape):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Applefits better
  3. Apricotfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against wine, sugar, egg, peach, grape. 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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