Name: Raspberry Shrub
Ingredients: 1 quart raspberry juice; ½ pound loaf sugar; 1 pint Jamaica rum or a mix of rum and brandy

Why it works: Raspberry and rum work together. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 80 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Raspberry Shrub

Ingredients

1 quart raspberry juice
½ pound loaf sugar
1 pint Jamaica rum or a mix of rum and brandy

Directions

Dissolve the sugar in the raspberry juice.
Add the rum or rum and brandy mixture and mix thoroughly.
Bottle for use.

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.

Raspberry + rumtop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together80 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Sugar + rumtop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,908 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Raspberry + sugartop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3,101 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Raspberry juice: Forms the liquid base and provides the main fruit flavour and tartness.
Loaf sugar: Sweetens the juice and balances its acidity once fully dissolved.
Jamaica rum: Adds alcohol that carries aroma and helps keep the shrub stable in storage.