Why it works: Sugar and apricot are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,630 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
To Dry Apricots
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Weigh the over-ripe apricots and arrange them in a bowl.
Stir in 14 ounces of sugar.
Cook
Simmer the apricots for 6 to 8 minutes until tender.
Remove the apricots and place them in a preserving pan.
Cover the apricots with cold water and bring to a boil.
Simmer the apricots until they are soft.
Dry and store
Drain the apricots and lay them on a soft cloth to dry.
Store the dried apricots in a cool, dry place.
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 + apricottop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together3,630 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Over-ripe apricots
- Supply the fruit flavour and the soft, chewy body that the finished dried apricots keep.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and, by binding water, helps the dried apricots keep well in storage.
The step that matters
Simmer until soft, not falling apart. Simmering softens the fruit by breaking down its cell walls. Cooking too long makes the apricots collapse into mush, so they lose the shape they need to dry well on the cloth.
“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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