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Drink

Mulled Wine

A warm beverage made with water, cinnamon, clove, wine, egg, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Mulled Wine

Ingredients

Directions

Make the spiced liquid

  1. In a saucepan, combine water, cinnamon, and clove, then boil for 10 minutes.

  2. Add wine and heat until just boiling.

Combine and serve

  1. In a bowl, beat the egg and sugar together until well combined.

  2. Slowly pour the hot wine mixture over the egg, stirring constantly.

  3. Serve hot.

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 + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Cinnamon + winetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,170 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-methoxybenzaldehyde (sweet, anise).

  4. Clove + winetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,958 recipes

    Shared aroma: cis-isoeugenol (clove, spicy).

  5. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

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

Wine
Forms the main liquid and gives the drink its body and fruity flavour.
Egg
Its proteins thicken the warm liquid slightly and add richness and body.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the acidity of the wine.
Cinnamon
Contributes warm, aromatic spice flavour as it steeps in the hot liquid.
Clove
Adds a strong aromatic spice note that deepens the drink's flavour.

The step that matters

Slowly pour the hot wine mixture over the egg, stirring constantly. Egg proteins set when exposed to heat. Adding the hot liquid gradually while stirring warms the egg evenly, so it thickens smoothly instead of scrambling into lumps.

Swap the clove

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Clovethe original
  3. Cardamomfits about as well
  4. Gingerfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against cinnamon, wine, egg, 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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