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Maraschino Syrup

A syrup made from orange juice, sugar, water, blanched bitter almonds, lemon rind, and maraschino.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Orange and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Maraschino Syrup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the syrup

  1. Strain the juice of the orange.

  2. Pour the juice and water over the sugar.

  3. Boil until it forms a thick syrup, then skim off any foam.

  4. Add the blanched almonds and lemon rind.

  5. When clear and thick, strain the syrup.

Serve

  1. Serve with maraschino stirred in.

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. Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  2. Orange + almondtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,125 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Almond + lemontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Sugar + almondtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,679 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

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

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

Sugar and lemon 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

Sugar
Provides sweetness and, as it dissolves and thickens, body to the syrup.
Maraschino
Adds a distinctive cherry-almond aroma and flavour to the finished syrup.
Blanched bitter almonds
Contribute a subtle nutty, bitter aroma that flavours the syrup as it cooks.
Sweet orange juice
Supplies fruity acidity and citrus flavour to balance the sugar.

The step that matters

Skimming the foam while boiling. Boiling sugar with fruit juice produces foam and impurities that rise to the surface. Skimming them keeps the syrup clear and prevents off flavours and cloudiness in the finished product.

Swap the almond

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

  1. Almondthe original
  2. Pistachiofits about as well
  3. Chickpeafits less well
  4. Chestnutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against orange, sugar, lemon. 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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