Skip to main content
Drink

Burnt Punch a LA Frangaise

A flaming punch made with lemon juice, French brandy, old arrack, pineapple rum, dry curaçao, and arrack.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Pineapple and rum work together. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 451 recipes. Both carry ethyl isobutyrate, which smells fruity, ethereal. The science ↓

Burnt Punch a LA Frangaise

Ingredients

Directions

Mix

  1. Combine lemon juice, French brandy, old arrack, and fine pineapple rum in a bowl, then stir the mixture.

Burn and serve

  1. Set the mixture on fire.

  2. Ladle the mixture until the flame begins to subside.

  3. Add the arrack and dry curaçao.

  4. Ladle out the punch.

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. Pineapple + rumtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

  2. Brandy + rumtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,058 recipes

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

  3. Brandy + pineappletop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together298 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  4. Lemon + pineappletop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,964 recipes

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

  5. Lemon + rumtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

What each ingredient does

Lemon juice
Adds acidity that balances the sweetness and strong spirits in the punch.
French brandy
Provides the main spirit base and aromatic depth that carries the drink.
Old arrack
Adds a rich, funky aroma and body to the punch.
Fine pineapple rum
Contributes sweetness and tropical fruit character to the blend.
Dry curaçao
Adds citrus-orange aroma and a touch of sweetness.

The step that matters

Ladling until the flame subsides. Setting the spirits alight burns off some alcohol and concentrates flavor. Ladling the liquid between the bowl and the cup mixes it and smothers the flame, so stopping at the right moment keeps the punch safe to serve and balanced.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Apricotfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Bananafits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against brandy, pineapple, rum. 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.

You might also like

Lemon WheyLemon Whey33 recipesLemon WineLemon Wine31 recipesPineapple LemonadePineapple Lemonade18 recipesPineapple PunchPineapple Punch18 recipes