Name: Raspberry Vinegar
Ingredients: 2 quarts ripe red raspberries; 1½ cups cider vinegar; 1 pound loaf sugar

Why it works: Cider and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,431 recipes. Both carry 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol, which smells smoky, clove. The science ↓

Raspberry Vinegar

Ingredients

2 quarts ripe red raspberries
1½ cups cider vinegar
1 pound loaf sugar

Directions

Infuse the fruit

Place the raspberries in a stone jar and cover with cider vinegar.
Let it stand for 12 hours.
Pour the vinegar over 1 gallon of fresh raspberries.
Let it stand overnight.

Make the syrup

Add 1 pound of loaf sugar for every pint of juice.
Boil for 3 minutes, then skim.
Bottle.

Serve

Mix ½ glass of juice with 1 glass of water to serve.

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.

Cider + vinegartop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,431 recipes

Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).
Vinegar + sugartop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,806 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Cider + sugartop 27% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3,308 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Ripe red raspberries: Supply the main fruit flavor, aroma and red color of the vinegar.
Cider vinegar: Adds sharp acidity that extracts fruit flavor and gives the drink its tang.
Loaf sugar: Adds sweetness that balances the acidity and helps preserve the syrup.

“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.