Name: Making Vinegar
Ingredients: 4 parts juice (from fermented fruit); 1 part vinegar (as a starter); water (if using high sugar fruits like persimmons)

Why it works: Vinegar and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 20,806 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Making Vinegar

Ingredients

4 parts juice (from fermented fruit)
1 part vinegar (as a starter)
water (if using high sugar fruits like persimmons)

Directions

Separate the juice from the mash after alcoholic fermentation, using cheesecloth or a hand press if necessary.
Add 1 part vinegar to 4 parts juice and cover the jar.
Wait a few days for a thin film (mother of vinegar) to form on the surface.
Avoid stirring to keep the mother intact.
Test acidity regularly until it reaches maximum.
Filter the vinegar and bottle it.

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.

Vinegar + sugartop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,806 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Sugar + persimmontop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together75 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
Vinegar + persimmontop 25% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together17 recipes

Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).