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Dessert

Citron Preserves

A preserve made from citron, sugar, raisins, lemons, cloves, cinnamon, and lemon extract.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Citron Preserves

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the citron

  1. Boil the citron pieces in water until tender enough to pierce with a straw.

  2. Drain the water and add 1 pound of sugar for each pound of citron.

Cook the preserve

  1. Add the raisins, sliced lemons, cloves, and cinnamon.

  2. Dissolve the sugar over heat, then add the citron and simmer slowly for 2 hours.

Finish

  1. Once cooled, add lemon extract to taste.

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. Clove + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Lemon + cinnamontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,950 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Raisin + clovetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,070 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  5. Lemon + clovetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,150 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Citron
Forms the bulk of the preserve and turns tender and translucent as it cooks.
Sugar
Sweetens the fruit and, as it dissolves, thickens the syrup and helps preserve it.
Raisins
Add chewy texture and concentrated sweetness to the preserve.
Lemons
Add acidity and bright citrus aroma that balances the sugar.
Cinnamon
Adds warm, sweet aroma to the syrup and fruit.

The step that matters

Boiling the citron until tender. Citron must be boiled until a straw pierces it. Undercooked pieces stay tough and fibrous, while overcooking makes them break down before the slow simmer in sugar.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Quincefits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, raisin, clove, 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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