Why it works: Sugar and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 20,806 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓
Spiced Cherries
Ingredients
Directions
Chop the cherries using a meat chopper.
Cook the cherries with an equal weight of sugar until thick, like jam.
Once thick, add 1 cup of vinegar for each gallon of cherries and spices to taste.
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 + vinegartop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together20,806 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Cherries
- Form the bulk of the preserve, providing fruit flavor and body once cooked down.
- Sugar
- Thickens the cherries into a jam-like texture and adds sweetness.
- Vinegar
- Adds acidity that balances the sweetness and sharpens the flavor.
The step that matters
Cooking the cherries with sugar until thick. Sugar draws water out of the fruit and, as the mixture cooks down, pectin in the cherries sets it into a jam-like thickness. Stopping too early leaves it runny, while cooking too long can make it stick or scorch.
“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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