Skip to main content
Dessert

Peach Jam

A jam made from peaches, orange, crushed pineapple, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Peach and pineapple match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 168 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Peach Jam

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Combine the peaches, orange, crushed pineapple, and sugar in a large bowl.

  2. Let the mixture stand overnight.

Cook

  1. Simmer gently until done.

  2. Add the sliced peach pit meats before finishing.

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. Peach + pineappletop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together168 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Orange + pineappletop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,664 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

  3. Peach + orangetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together385 recipes

    Shared aroma: pinene (pine, turpentine).

  4. Peach + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,308 recipes

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

  5. Pineapple + sugartop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,841 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

Peaches
Provide the main fruit body, flavor, and natural pectin that helps the jam thicken.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the jam set by binding water and working with fruit pectin.
Orange
Its grated rind adds aromatic citrus oils and a slight bitterness that balances the sweetness.
Crushed pineapple
Adds acidity and tropical flavor, and its juice adds moisture to the fruit mixture.

The step that matters

Simmer gently until done. Sugar can scorch and fruit can break down or turn bitter if boiled too hard. Gentle heat lets water evaporate slowly so the sugar and pectin set into a thick, smooth jam.

Swap the orange

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Apricotfits better
  3. Pearfits better
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against peach, pineapple, sugar. 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.

You might also like

Orange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipesOrange Cream Rice PuddingOrange Cream Rice Pudding121 recipesPineapple SherbetPineapple Sherbet116 recipesOrange GelatinOrange Gelatin100 recipes