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Dessert

Blackberry Syrup

A sweet syrup made from blackberry juice, loaf sugar, nutmeg, cinnamon, cloves, allspice, and French brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Blackberry Syrup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the syrup

  1. Combine the blackberry juice and loaf sugar in a pot.

  2. Add the nutmeg, ground cinnamon, cloves, and allspice.

  3. Boil the mixture for a short time.

Finish

  1. Allow the syrup to cool, then stir in the French brandy.

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. Nutmeg + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Cinnamon + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Nutmeg + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,331 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Blackberry juice
Provides the liquid base, colour and fruit flavour of the syrup.
Loaf sugar
Adds sweetness and body, and helps the syrup keep.
French brandy
Adds aroma and warmth, and its alcohol helps preserve the syrup.
Nutmeg
Adds warm, aromatic spice flavour.
Ground cinnamon
Adds warm, sweet aroma and spice flavour.
Cloves
Adds strong, pungent aroma and spice flavour.

The step that matters

Stir in the brandy after cooling. Alcohol and the volatile aroma compounds in brandy evaporate when heated, so adding it to hot syrup wastes much of its aroma and flavour. Waiting until the syrup cools keeps the brandy's character in the finished syrup.

Swap the blackberry

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, nutmeg, cinnamon, clove, allspice, brandy):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Blackberrythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, nutmeg, cinnamon, clove, allspice, brandy. 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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