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Tarragon Vinegar

A vinegar infused with tarragon leaves, clarified with isinglass and sherry, then bottled.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: White wine and sherry match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 307 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

Tarragon Vinegar

Ingredients

Directions

Infuse

  1. Place tarragon leaves in a stone jar and cover with white wine vinegar.

  2. Let the mixture infuse for 16 days.

  3. Drain and strain the liquid through a flannel bag.

Clarify

  1. Dissolve isinglass in sherry wine and add to the vinegar for every 2 gallons.

  2. Agitate the mixture in a large stone bottle for 2 days.

Age and bottle

  1. Let it sit for 1 month to develop flavor.

  2. Transfer to clean, dry glass bottles, cork, and seal.

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. White wine + sherrytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together307 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  2. Tarragon + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,547 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Tarragon + white winetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together409 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  4. White wine + vinegartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,776 recipes

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

  5. Vinegar + sherrytop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together660 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

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

What each ingredient does

Tarragon leaves
Supply the main aroma and herbal flavor that the vinegar takes up during infusion.
White wine vinegar
Acts as the solvent that extracts tarragon flavor and gives the finished liquid its sharp acidity.
Isinglass
A fining agent that binds suspended particles so they settle out, clearing the vinegar.

The step that matters

Dissolving the isinglass. Isinglass must be fully dissolved before it is added, otherwise lumps spread unevenly through the vinegar and fail to bind the cloudy particles that the fining is meant to remove.

Swap the tarragon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (white wine, vinegar, sherry, wine):

  1. Thymefits about as well
  2. Tarragonthe original
  3. Garlicfits less well
  4. Peppermintfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against white wine, vinegar, sherry, wine. 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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