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Mint Punch

A chilled mint and lemon beverage with ginger ale and shaved ice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Mint and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,998 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Mint Punch

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mint

  1. Chop the mint finely and combine it with ½ cup sugar and the juice of 2 lemons.

  2. Mash thoroughly and let it stand for 1 hour, stirring occasionally.

  3. Strain the mixture and add the juice of 4 more lemons, ½ cup sugar, and 1 pint of water reduced to a syrup.

Finish and serve

  1. Add the sliced yellow rind of 2 lemons and some freshly cut mint, then stir well.

  2. Just before serving, add 1 quart of shaved ice and 2 quarts of ginger ale.

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. Mint + lemontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,998 recipes

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

  2. Lemon + gingertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,154 recipes

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

  3. Mint + gingertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together647 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + syruptop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,842 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Syrup + gingertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together950 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Mint
Provides the herbal, aromatic flavour that defines the punch.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps draw flavour out of the mashed mint.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the punch and balances the sugar.
Ginger ale
Adds carbonation and sweetness for a light, fizzy body.

The step that matters

Adding the ginger ale and ice just before serving. Ginger ale is carbonated, so adding it early lets fizz escape and the drink go flat. Adding the shaved ice at the last moment keeps the punch cold without diluting it too soon.

Swap the mint

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, lemon, syrup, ginger):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Corianderfits better
  4. Mintthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, lemon, syrup, ginger. 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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