Skip to main content

A Syrup

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

A Syrup

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Steep spikenard, cinnamon, Virginia snakeroot, parsley, pleurisy root, cloves, and gum myrrh in 2 quarts of water for 3 hours.

  2. Strain the mixture and simmer it down to 1 pint.

  3. While warm, add 1 pound of sugar and 1 pint of port wine.

  4. Bottle the syrup.

  5. Take a dose of ½ to 2 wine glasses three times a day, depending on the patient's strength.

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Parsley + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,768 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Cinnamon + parsleytop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together603 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Clove + port winetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together914 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Allspicefits better
  3. Gingerfits better
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cinnamon, clove, sugar, port wine. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

You might also like

Wine WheyWine Whey111 recipesRaisin WineRaisin Wine64 recipesEgg WineEgg Wine58 recipesElderberry WineElderberry Wine51 recipes