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Sago Gruel

A sweet sago gruel flavored with cinnamon and red wine, served warm with a lemon slice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,950 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Sago Gruel

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the sago

  1. Scald the sago in hot water, then strain it through a fine sieve.

  2. Place the sago in a pot with 2 quarts of water and the stick of cinnamon.

  3. Skim the mixture until it thickens and becomes clear.

Finish and serve

  1. Remove the cinnamon and add 1 pint of red wine.

  2. Sweeten to taste and warm gently without boiling.

  3. Pour into a tureen and add a slice of lemon before serving.

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. Cinnamon + lemontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,950 recipes

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

  2. Cinnamon + sugartop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Cinnamon + red winetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together312 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  4. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Red wine + lemontop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together779 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Cinnamon and sugar 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

Sago
Starch that thickens the liquid into a porridge as it cooks.
Red wine
Adds acidity and colour, giving the porridge its tart, rich flavour.
Sugar
Adds sweetness to balance the acidity of the wine.

The step that matters

Warm gently without boiling. Once the wine is added, boiling can make the alcohol harsh and the flavour less fresh, and can cause the thickened starch to break down and turn thin. Gentle heat keeps the texture and taste balanced.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Pearfits better
  3. Plumfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cinnamon, red wine, sugar. 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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