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Roman Punch

A chilled cocktail made with champagne, rum, Maraschino liqueur, lemon water ice, and vanilla.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Roman Punch

Why it works: Champagne and rum match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 137 recipes. Both carry ethyl isobutyrate, which smells fruity, ethereal. The science ↓

Roman Punch

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Freeze the lemon water ice very hard.

  2. Slowly mix the liquors with the ice.

  3. Beat the mixture well.

  4. Pack and cover the freezer tightly.

Ripen and serve

  1. Let it stand for 4 hours to ripen.

  2. Serve in glasses.

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. Champagne + rumtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together137 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

  2. Rum + vanillatop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together728 recipes

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

  3. Champagne + lemontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together404 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  4. Champagne + vanillatop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together58 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

  5. Lemon + vanillatop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,961 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Lemon water ice
Forms the frozen base, supplying sweetness, acidity and the icy texture.
Jamaica rum
Adds strong flavour and alcohol, which softens the frozen mixture so it stays scoopable.
Maraschino
Adds sweetness and a distinct cherry-like aroma.
Champagne
Adds dry, fruity flavour and extra acidity to the punch.
Vanilla
Adds a rounded aroma that complements the rum and liqueur.

The step that matters

Slowly mix the liquors with the ice. Alcohol lowers the freezing point and melts ice, so the ice must be very hard and the liquors added slowly. Otherwise the mixture turns watery and fails to set.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (champagne, rum, vanilla):

  1. Pineapplefits better
  2. Strawberryfits better
  3. Bananafits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against champagne, rum, vanilla. 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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