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To Make Melon Citron

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Wine and brandy are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,427 recipes. Both carry gamma-nonanolactone, which smells coconut, sweet. The science ↓

To Make Melon Citron

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Cut the melons into quarters and remove the seeds.

  2. Soak the melon quarters in a mixture of salt and water for three days.

  3. Drain and dry the melon quarters, then place them in sugar and simmer for 15 minutes.

  4. Repeat the boiling process for three days.

  5. On the final day, add Mountain wine, a little brandy, and more sugar to the syrup.

  6. Clarify the syrup and boil until it reaches a candied consistency.

  7. Add the melons to the syrup and boil them.

  8. Transfer the melons to jars and seal tightly with bladder and leather.

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. Wine + brandytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,427 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  2. Melon + winetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together52 recipes

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

  3. Melon + brandytop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together33 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + brandytop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together11,939 recipes

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

  5. Melon + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together796 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

Swap the melon

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

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

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

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