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Ratafia of Green Walnut Shells

A liqueur made by infusing young walnuts in brandy with nutmeg and cloves, then filtering it.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,686 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Ratafia of Green Walnut Shells

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Choose 200 young walnuts that a pin can easily pierce.

  2. Pound the walnuts in a mortar.

Infuse

  1. Infuse the walnuts in the brandy with nutmeg and cloves for a month.

Strain and bottle

  1. After a month, strain the mixture through a flannel bag.

  2. Filter the liquid 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.

  1. Nutmeg + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Walnut + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,230 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Walnut + clovetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,592 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Brandy + clovetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,362 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  5. Brandy + nutmegtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,311 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

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

What each ingredient does

Young walnuts
Provide the main flavour and colour as they steep in the brandy.
Brandy
Extracts flavour from the walnuts and acts as the base liquor that preserves the infusion.
Sugar
Adds sweetness to balance the bitter, astringent flavour of the walnuts.

The step that matters

Choosing young walnuts. Young walnuts have soft shells and tender interiors that release flavour into the brandy. Mature walnuts have hard, woody shells that resist infusion, so a pin test confirms the nuts are young enough to use.

Swap the walnut

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (brandy, sugar, nutmeg, clove):

  1. Chestnutfits better
  2. Almondfits better
  3. Walnutthe original
  4. Pistachiofits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against brandy, sugar, nutmeg, clove. 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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