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Blackberry Cordial

A sweet alcoholic beverage made from blackberries, sugar, spices, and brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Blackberry Cordial

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 ↓

Blackberry Cordial

Ingredients

Directions

Extract the juice

  1. Place the blackberries in a jar and submerge them in boiling water until they turn to mush.

  2. Press or strain out the juice.

Spice and bottle

  1. Add the loaf sugar and whole spices to the juice.

  2. Boil until the flavors are extracted.

  3. Once cooled, remove the spices.

  4. Stir in the brandy, then bottle and seal.

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Cinnamon + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Blackberries
Provide the main fruit flavor, color and juice for the cordial.
Loaf sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the tartness of the blackberry juice.
Brandy
Adds alcohol that helps preserve the cordial and carries its aroma.
Whole cinnamon
Contributes warm, sweet aroma as its flavor compounds dissolve into the hot juice.

The step that matters

Remove the spices once cooled. Whole spices keep releasing flavor into the liquid as it sits. Leaving them in too long can make the cordial harsh, bitter or overly spiced, so they should be taken out once the juice has cooled.

Swap the allspice

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Allspicethe original
  3. Cardamomfits less well
  4. Gingerfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cinnamon, clove, 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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