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Drink

Ginger Wine

A fermented beverage made with ginger, raisins, lemon, yeast, and brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Ginger and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,154 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Ginger Wine

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Boil 5 gallons of water with 7 pounds of powdered sugar for 15 minutes, skimming off any scum.

  2. Cool the mixture and transfer it to a tub.

  3. Boil 5 ounces of ginger in 2 quarts of water until reduced to 1 quart, adding the peels of 2 large lemons.

  4. Once cooled, add the ginger mixture to the tub along with 2 ounces of isinglass.

Ferment and age

  1. Toast a slice of bread, spread it thick with good yeast, and place it in the tub.

  2. Let it sit overnight, then remove the bread and transfer it to a cask with 1 pint of brandy.

  3. Seal the cask and let it stand for 6 weeks before bottling.

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. Ginger + lemontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,154 recipes

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

  2. Raisin + gingertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,242 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Raisin + brandytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,768 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + raisintop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,481 recipes

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

  5. Raisin + lemontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,742 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Powdered sugar
Provides sweetness and the sugar that yeast ferments into alcohol.
Sun raisins
Supply sugars and fruit flavour that feed the fermentation.
Ginger
Adds the spicy aroma and warm flavour that defines the wine.
Isinglass
Fining agent that helps clear the wine by settling suspended particles.
Good yeast
Drives fermentation, converting sugars into alcohol and carbon dioxide.
Brandy
Raises the alcohol content, adding strength and helping preserve the wine.

The step that matters

Seal the cask and let it stand for 6 weeks before bottling. Fermentation produces carbon dioxide, and the wine needs time to finish and clear before bottling. Bottling too early can leave the wine cloudy or cause bottles to build pressure.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, raisin, ginger, bread, brandy):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, raisin, ginger, bread, brandy. 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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