Name: Apricot Sauce
Ingredients: ½ pint tinned apricots and their juice; rind of half a lemon; a few drops of essence of ratafia; ¼ cup water; a little coloring; 1 tablespoon lemon juice; sugar to taste

Why it works: Apricot and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,098 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Apricot Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Combine the apricots, water, lemon rind, and lemon juice in a saucepan.
Simmer until the mixture can be passed through a fine sieve.
Add sugar to taste.
Reheat the mixture.
Stir in the coloring and essence before serving.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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.

Apricot + lemontop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,098 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Apricot + sugartop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3,630 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together53,532 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Lemon and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Apricots: Provide the main fruit flavour and body, thickening the sauce once simmered and sieved.
Lemon juice: Adds acidity that brightens the sweet apricot flavour and balances the sugar.
Sugar: Adds sweetness, adjusted to taste after the fruit has been cooked down.

The step that matters

Simmer until the mixture can be passed through a fine sieve. The fruit must cook long enough to soften fully so it breaks down into a smooth purée. Undercooked fruit stays lumpy and will not pass cleanly through the sieve, leaving a grainy sauce.