Why it works: Fig and brandy work together. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 222 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓
Figs in Syrup
Ingredients
Directions
Prick the figs all over.
Drop each fig into cold water as you finish pricking them.
Prepare a syrup by boiling sugar with water until it reaches the right consistency.
Fill bottles with the figs and pour the syrup over them.
Top off with good brandy and cork the bottles tightly.
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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Fig + brandytop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together222 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Fig + sugartop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,241 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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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
Swap the fig
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, brandy):
- Vanillafits better
- Apricotfits better
- Raisinfits about as well
- Figthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, brandy. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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