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Ratafia, Gooseberry

A liqueur made by infusing gooseberries, spices, sugar, bitter almonds, and brandy for three months.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and almond match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,514 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Ratafia, Gooseberry

Ingredients

Directions

Infuse

  1. Combine gooseberries, cinnamon, mace, sugar, and bitter almonds in a large container.

  2. Pour in the French brandy and seal the container tightly.

  3. Let the mixture infuse for 3 months.

Filter and bottle

  1. After 3 months, press out the gooseberries and filter the liquid through filtering paper.

  2. Store the filtered liquid in pint bottles.

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 + almondtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,514 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Cinnamon + macetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Cinnamon + brandytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,199 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  5. Almond + brandytop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,969 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

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

Gooseberries
Provide the fruit flavour and tartness that the infused brandy carries.
French brandy
Acts as the solvent that extracts flavour from the fruit, almonds and spices.
Lump sugar
Sweetens the liquor and balances the sharpness of the gooseberries.
Bitter almonds
Contribute a characteristic nutty, almond-like aroma to the liquor.

The step that matters

Sealing the container tightly during infusion. A tight seal keeps alcohol and aromatic compounds from evaporating over the long three-month infusion, so the flavour stays concentrated and the liquid is not lost or spoiled by air exposure.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Clovefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cinnamon, sugar, almond, brandy. 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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