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Drink

Ginger Cup

A citrus and ginger beverage made with oranges, lemons, pineapple, ginger ale, spices, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Ginger Cup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Push the cloves into the oranges and let them stand for 1 hour to extract flavor.

  2. Rub the sugar over the rinds of the oranges and lemons, then add their juice to the sugar.

  3. Add the spices and pineapple, and let the mixture stand for 2 hours.

Serve

  1. At serving time, add the water and ginger ale, and pour over cracked ice.

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 + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Clove + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Ginger + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Ginger + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Oranges
Supply juice and aromatic oil from the rinds, giving the punch its citrus flavor.
Lemons
Add acidity that balances the sweetness and brightens the punch.
Sugar
Sweetens the punch and draws oils from the rinds as it is rubbed in.
Cloves
Contribute warm, aromatic spice flavor as they steep in the fruit.
Ginger ale
Adds sweetness, carbonation and ginger flavor at the end.

The step that matters

Resting the fruit and sugar. Rubbing sugar over the rinds draws out fragrant citrus oils, and the standing time lets the cloves, spices and juice infuse the mixture. Skipping the rest leaves the flavor flat.

Swap the pineapple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (orange, lemon, sugar, ginger, clove, cinnamon, nutmeg):

  1. Limefits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Pineapplethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against orange, lemon, sugar, ginger, clove, cinnamon, nutmeg. 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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