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Mint Jelly

Mint jelly is a gelatin dessert made with mint, lemon juice, sugar, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Mint Jelly

Why it works: Mint and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,998 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Mint Jelly

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mint infusion

  1. Soak the mint in boiling water for 1 hour, then strain.

Make the jelly

  1. Dissolve the gelatin in cold water.

  2. Add lemon juice, sugar, and green coloring to the gelatin mixture.

  3. Combine with the strained mint.

  4. Heat in a double boiler, then pour into molds that have been wet with water.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Mint + lemontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,998 recipes

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

  2. Gelatin + sugartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,778 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  4. Gelatin + lemontop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,215 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-pinene (pine, resin).

  5. Mint + sugartop 32% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,592 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

Lemon and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Mint
Provides the main flavor and aroma of the jelly.
Gelatin
Sets the liquid into a firm, sliceable jelly as it cools.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the sharpness of the lemon juice.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the mint flavor and balances the sugar.

The step that matters

Heating in a double boiler. Gelatin must be heated gently and only until dissolved. Strong or prolonged heat can weaken its setting power, so the jelly may fail to firm up properly.

Swap the mint

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Gingerfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Mintthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against gelatin, lemon, 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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