Why it works: Sugar and currant are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 26% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 12,256 recipes. The science ↓
Cherby Jam
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the fruit
Weigh the cherries before stoning and add sugar equal to half the weight of the fruit.
Stone the cherries and boil them in a preserving pan until nearly all the juice is dried up.
Make the jam
Add the crushed sugar and red currant juice, using 1 pint of juice for every 6 lbs of cherries.
Boil all together until it jellies, about 20 minutes to 1 hour.
Skim the jam well and stir frequently.
A few minutes before it's done, crack some of the stones and add the kernels for flavor.
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 + curranttop 26% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together12,256 recipes
Sugar and currant barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,256 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 bulk, flavor and pectin-bearing pulp that the jam is built from.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the jam and, with boiling, helps it thicken and set as it cooks down.
- Red-currant juice
- Adds acidity and natural pectin to help the jam set and balance the sweetness.
The step that matters
Boil until it jellies. Jam sets only when enough water evaporates and sugar and pectin reach the right concentration. Undercooking leaves it runny, while overcooking can make it stiff and dull in flavor.
“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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