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To Preserve Peaches

A method for preserving peaches in sugar syrup and brandy, then jarred.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Peach and brandy work together. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 339 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

To Preserve Peaches

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the peaches

  1. Peel and halve the peaches.

  2. Weigh the peaches and use the same weight in sugar.

Make the syrup

  1. In a porcelain kettle, combine sugar and enough cold water to cover it.

  2. Add the beaten egg whites to the sugar mixture.

  3. Stir well and heat over the fire.

  4. Boil and skim until the syrup is clear.

  5. Remove any scum that rises to the top.

Cook and preserve

  1. Add the peaches and cook slowly until the syrup thickens to honey consistency.

  2. While warm, pack the peaches into jars.

  3. Dip a piece of white paper in brandy and place it on the peaches.

  4. Seal the jars tightly and store in a dry place.

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 + brandytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together339 recipes

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

  2. Egg + brandytop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,340 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetoin (butter, cream).

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

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

  4. Sugar + brandytop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together11,939 recipes

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

  5. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

Sugar and brandy barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 11,939 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

Sugar
Sweetens the fruit and, with the cooked syrup, thickens to a honey-like consistency that helps preserve it.
Egg whites
When heated, they coagulate and collect impurities, which are skimmed off to clarify the syrup.
Clear stone peaches
The fruit being preserved; it softens and absorbs syrup as it cooks slowly.

The step that matters

Skimming the syrup until clear. Egg white coagulates as the syrup heats and traps impurities on the surface. Removing this scum as it forms leaves a clear syrup; skimming late or stirring it back in leaves it cloudy.

Swap the peach

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Apricotfits better
  4. Peachthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, brandy. 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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