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Dessert

Ale Jelly

A gelatinous dessert made from boiled ox foot stock, sugar, lemon, spices, beer, and eggs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Ale Jelly

Ingredients

Directions

Make the stock

  1. Put the ox foot into 3 quarts of water and boil until the bones are bare.

  2. Strain the stock and let it cool, removing the fat.

Clarify and flavour

  1. Cut the stock into 4 pieces and place in a pan with the sugar, lemon juice and rind, cloves, cinnamon, and beer.

  2. Add the beaten eggs and the whites and shells of the 3 eggs.

  3. Boil for 5 minutes, stirring constantly.

  4. Remove from heat and let it settle on the floor without stirring.

Strain and set

  1. Prepare a jelly bag and another vessel to catch the clear jelly.

  2. As soon as it runs clear, gently return the finest jelly to the bag without shaking it.

  3. Use a metal mold for the jelly, as it will not turn out of earthenware.

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. Clove + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Lemon + cinnamontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,950 recipes

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

  3. Lemon + clovetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,150 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Clove + beertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together284 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Ox foot
Its bones and connective tissue release gelatin, which sets the stock into a jelly.
Eggs
Whites and shells collect cloudy particles as they set, clarifying the jelly to a clear result.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour and balances the sugar.
Lisbon sugar
Provides sweetness and body to the jelly.
Beer
Adds a light malty aroma and flavour to the jelly.

The step that matters

Letting the jelly settle and straining it. Stirring or shaking after the boil disturbs the clarifying egg raft, leaving the jelly cloudy. Letting it settle undisturbed and returning only the finest, clear jelly to the bag keeps it bright.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, clove, cinnamon, beer, egg):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Applefits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, clove, cinnamon, beer, egg. 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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