Name: Wild Black Cherry Cough Syrup
Ingredients: ½ pound wild black cherry; 3 pounds loaf sugar; 1 quart water; 4 oz. tincture ipecacuanha; 4 oz. paregoric; 4 oz. tincture bloodroot; 4 oz. antimonial wine

Why it works: Cherry and wine work together. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 423 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity. The science ↓

Wild Black Cherry Cough Syrup

Ingredients

Directions

Soak the inside of the bark overnight in a covered earthen dish.
In the morning, simmer the mixture (do not boil) until reduced to 1 pint of water, keeping it covered.
Strain the hot mixture over the sugar and stir in the tinctures and antimonial wine.
Set the pitcher of syrup in hot water to dissolve the sugar, keeping it covered.
Once the sugar is dissolved, bottle and cork tightly.
Take 1 teaspoon every 4 hours, or sip ¼ teaspoon whenever you cough.

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.

Cherry + winetop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together423 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity).
Cherry + sugartop 20% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,598 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sugar + winetop 31% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together9,581 recipes

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