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Peppermint Water

A simple peppermint-infused water with sugar, brandy, and peppermint oil.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and brandy are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 19% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,939 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Peppermint Water

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Place the lump of sugar in a small container.

  2. Add 5 drops of oil of peppermint onto the sugar.

  3. Pour in 1 teaspoon of brandy.

  4. Fill the container with water, up to ½ pint.

  5. Seal the container and shake well.

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. Sugar + brandytop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together11,939 recipes

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

  2. Peppermint + brandytop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together79 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Peppermint + sugartop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,082 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and brandy barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 11,939 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

Oil of peppermint
Supplies the main mint flavour and aroma.
Sugar
Adds sweetness to balance the sharpness of the mint.
Brandy
Alcohol helps the oil disperse through the water and adds aroma.

The step that matters

Seal the container and shake well.. Peppermint oil does not dissolve in water and will float or cling in droplets. Shaking breaks it into finer droplets and spreads it through the liquid, so each portion tastes evenly minty. The brandy helps the oil mix in more readily.

Swap the peppermint

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Gingerfits better
  4. Peppermintthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, 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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