Name: Port Wine Negus
Ingredients: 1 quart new port wine; 1 tablespoon spirit of cloves; 1 teacup sugar; 1 lemon, sliced; ½ nutmeg, grated; 2 quarts boiling water

Why it works: Clove and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,686 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Port Wine Negus

Ingredients

Directions

In a large pot, combine the port wine, spirit of cloves, sugar, lemon slices, and grated nutmeg.
Pour 2 quarts of boiling water over the mixture.
Stir well and serve hot.

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.

Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together8,686 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together11,318 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Clove + lemontop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together8,150 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Port wine + clovetop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together914 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
Spirit + clovetop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together152 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

What each ingredient does

Port wine: Provides the base body, fruity flavour, and wine character of the drink.
Sugar: Adds sweetness that balances the acidity of the lemon and the tannins of the port.
Lemon: Adds acidity that brightens the wine and offsets its sweetness.
Nutmeg: Adds a warm, aromatic spice flavour to the drink.
Spirit of cloves: Adds a strong clove aroma and warm spiced flavour.

Swap the lemon

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

Figfits better
Vanillafits better
Applefits better
Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against port wine, spirit, clove, sugar, nutmeg. 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.