Why it works: Sugar and brandy are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 19% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,939 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓
Cherry Jam
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Remove the stems and pits from the cherries.
Combine the cherries and sugar in a pot.
Cook and jar
Boil the mixture until it becomes clear.
Transfer the jam into jars and cover with brandy paper.
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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Sugar + brandytop 19% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together11,939 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Sugar and brandy barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 11,939 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
- Cherries
- Provide the fruit, flavor and most of the jam's body once cooked down.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the jam and helps it set as it cooks and thickens.
The step that matters
Boil until the mixture becomes clear. Boiling must go long enough to dissolve the sugar and thicken the fruit juices into a jam that sets. Stopping too early leaves a runny jam that may not keep well.
“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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