Why it works: Lemon and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,950 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓
Wine Jelly
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the gelatine
Pour 1½ cups of cold water over the gelatine and let it stand for 10 minutes.
Add 1½ cups of boiling water and stir until the gelatine is completely dissolved.
Make the jelly
Mix in 1 pint of sherry wine, 2 pints of sugar, thinly sliced lemons (discard the yellow rind), and broken cinnamon sticks.
Wash the egg shells, break the whites into a plate, and crush the shells into the whites.
Beat the egg whites slightly and stir into the mixture just before heating.
Bring the mixture to a boil several times, then remove from heat.
Strain through a flannel bag placed in a pan of boiling water, wringing it out just before adding the jelly.
Do not stir after adding the egg whites.
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.
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Lemon + cinnamontop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together7,950 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
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Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together30,779 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Wine + lemontop 13% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together6,157 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Wine + cinnamontop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,170 recipes
Shared aroma: 4-methoxybenzaldehyde (sweet, anise).
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Sherry + cinnamontop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together649 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
Sugar and cinnamon 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
- Gelatine
- Sets the liquid into a firm, wobbly jelly as it cools.
- Egg whites
- Bind to impurities and rise to the top, helping clarify the jelly as it is heated.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the jelly and helps give it body and a clear, glossy set.
- Sherry wine
- Adds alcohol flavour and aroma, along with its own sweetness and acidity.
- Lemons
- Add acidity and citrus aroma that balance the sweetness.
The step that matters
Do not stir after adding the egg whites. Egg whites clarify the jelly by coagulating and trapping cloudy particles as the mixture heats. Stirring breaks up the forming raft, so the particles disperse back into the liquid and the jelly turns cloudy.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sherry, wine, sugar, cinnamon, egg):
- Vanillafits better
- Applefits better
- Figfits better
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sherry, wine, sugar, cinnamon, egg. 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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