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Drink

Cider Champagne

A fermented beverage made from cider, spirit, honey or sugar, orange flower water, and skimmed milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Honey and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,336 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity. The science ↓

Cider Champagne

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Mix cider, proof spirit, and honey or sugar in a temperate location for 1 month.

  2. After a month, add orange flower water.

  3. Fine the mixture down with skimmed milk.

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. Honey + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,336 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity).

  2. Spirit + honeytop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together79 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl benzoate (sweet).

  3. Honey + orangetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,068 recipes

    Shared aroma: pinene (pine, turpentine).

  4. Cider + honeytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together256 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl decanoate (grape, waxy).

  5. Spirit + orangetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together171 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Cider
Forms the base liquid and supplies the fermentable juice that gives the drink its character.
Honey or sugar
Provides sweetness and the sugars that yeast convert during the month of standing.
Proof spirit
Raises the alcohol content, giving the finished drink strength and a fuller body.
Orange flower water
Adds a delicate floral aroma to the finished drink.
Skimmed milk
Acts as a fining agent, its proteins binding suspended particles so they settle and the drink clears.

The step that matters

Fining with skimmed milk. Milk must be mixed evenly through the whole batch so its proteins can reach and bind the suspended particles. Uneven mixing leaves cloudy patches, and the drink will not clear fully as it settles.

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cider, spirit, honey, milk):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against cider, spirit, honey, milk. 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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