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Drink

Tarragon or Astragon Vinegar

A vinegar infused with tarragon leaves, steeped for a week and then strained and bottled.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Mary Randolph · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 2 ingredients
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Tarragon or Astragon Vinegar

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the leaves

  1. Pick the tarragon leaves from the stem.

  2. Let the leaves lie in a dry place for forty-eight hours.

Steep

  1. Put the leaves in a pitcher.

  2. Add three pints of strong vinegar to the pitcher with the leaves.

  3. Cover the pitcher tightly.

  4. Let the mixture stand for a week.

  5. Strain the mixture.

  6. Let the strained liquid stand in the pitcher until it becomes quite clear.

Bottle

  1. Bottle the clear liquid.

  2. Cork the bottles tightly.

By Mary Randolph. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

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. See the original page.

Explore the science

What each ingredient does

Tarragon leaves
Provide the main aroma and flavour that the vinegar takes up during steeping.
Strong vinegar
Acts as the solvent that extracts flavour from the leaves and gives the drink its sharpness.

The step that matters

Cover the pitcher tightly. Vinegar is volatile and the aromatic oils in tarragon can escape into the air. A tight cover keeps the flavour in the liquid during the week-long steep.

“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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