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 flavouring
Soak the gelatine in cold water until fully absorbed.
Soak the grated lemon peel in the lemon juice for 1 hour.
Strain the juice through muslin, squeezing hard, into a bowl with the sugar and cinnamon.
Make the jelly
Add the soaked gelatine and pour in the boiling water, stirring continuously for 3 minutes.
Strain through a double flannel bag without squeezing and let it drip until empty.
Once cool, stir in the wine.
Set and unmould
Wet a mould with cold water and fill it with the jelly.
When firm, wrap a cloth soaked in hot water around the mould and invert it onto a glass dish.
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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Lemon + winetop 13% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together6,157 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Cinnamon + winetop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,170 recipes
Shared aroma: 4-methoxybenzaldehyde (sweet, anise).
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Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together53,532 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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, sliceable jelly as it cools.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and body to the jelly.
- Lemon juice
- Adds acidity that balances the sweetness and brightens the flavour.
- Wine
- Gives the jelly its main flavour, added once the mixture has cooled.
The step that matters
Straining through the flannel bag without squeezing. Squeezing forces fine solids and cloudiness through the cloth, leaving the jelly murky. Letting it drip slowly keeps the finished jelly clear and bright.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, cinnamon, wine):
- Vanillafits better
- Applefits better
- Raisinfits better
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cinnamon, wine. 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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