Why it works: Peach and apple match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 303 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓
Peach Compote
Ingredients
Directions
Cut the peaches in half and remove the stones.
Place the peaches in boiling water until soft.
Transfer the peaches to cold water until cool, then peel them.
Combine the peaches with refined sugar and bring to a boil several times.
Drain the peaches using a skimming spoon and place them in compote dishes.
Add apple jelly to the peaches and boil until it reaches a thin jelly consistency.
Pour the jelly over the peaches in the dishes.
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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Peach + appletop 3% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together303 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Peach + sugartop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,308 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Sugar + appletop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together16,478 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Sugar and apple barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 16,478 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 apple
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (peach, sugar):
- Vanillafits better
- Apricotfits better
- Pearfits better
- Applethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against peach, sugar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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