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Drink

Yeast

A fermented beverage made with water, hops, potatoes, flour, sugar, yeast, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 92,116 recipes. Both carry phenylacetaldehyde, which smells hawthorne, honey. The science ↓

Yeast

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mixture

  1. Boil the water and hops well.

  2. Strain the mixture.

  3. Add the grated potatoes and flour.

  4. Stir and let it just boil up.

  5. Turn into a crock.

  6. Add the sugar.

  7. Let it cool slightly.

Add the yeast and rise

  1. Dissolve the yeast cake in a little warm water.

  2. Add it to the mixture.

  3. Let it rise.

  4. Stir down once.

  5. Transfer to a jug.

  6. Add the salt.

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. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  2. Potato + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,355 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Potato + sugartop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Hops + flourtop 32% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together10 recipes

    Shared aroma: eugenol (clove, spicy).

  5. Hops + potatotop 39% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Yeast cake
Produces carbon dioxide through fermentation, making the drink rise and become lightly effervescent.
White sugar
Provides the food that yeast ferments, so it drives the rise and adds sweetness.
Grated potatoes
Supply starch and body, adding texture to the drink.
Hops
Contribute bitterness and aroma, balancing the sweetness.

The step that matters

Let it cool slightly before adding the yeast. Yeast is killed by very hot liquid, so the mixture must be cool enough that the yeast stays alive and can ferment the sugar.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Arrowrootfits better
  3. Parsnipfits better
  4. Potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against hops, flour, 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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