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Dessert

Sweet Apple Pickles

A sweet preserve of apples simmered in brown sugar, vinegar, and cinnamon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and apple are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,598 recipes. Both carry methyl cinnamate, which smells strawberry. The science ↓

Sweet Apple Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a pot, combine brown sugar, vinegar, and cinnamon to make a syrup.

  2. Add the pared and cored apples to the syrup and cook until soft.

  3. Transfer the apples to jars or cans, cover with hot syrup, and seal.

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. Cinnamon + appletop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,598 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  2. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

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

  4. Vinegar + appletop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,884 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, fruity).

  5. Sugar + appletop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together16,478 recipes

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

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Sweet apples
Provide the fruit that softens in the syrup and becomes the pickled product.
Brown sugar
Sweetens the syrup and balances the sharpness of the vinegar.
Vinegar
Acidifies the syrup, giving the pickle its tang and helping preserve the apples.
Cinnamon
Adds warm, aromatic spice flavor to the syrup.

The step that matters

Sealing the jars while the syrup is hot. Covering the apples with hot syrup and sealing them while hot helps drive air out and keeps the contents sealed against spoilage. Vinegar and sugar in the syrup also inhibit microbial growth.

Swap the apple

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits about as well
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Applethe original

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

“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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