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Dandelion Tonic

A fermented beverage made from dandelion blossoms, sugar, citrus, and yeast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Orange and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Dandelion Tonic

Ingredients

Directions

Steep the blossoms

  1. Fill a gallon jar with dandelion blossoms.

  2. Pour boiling water over the blossoms and let stand for three days.

  3. Drain the mixture and add sugar to the water.

  4. Heat until the sugar is dissolved, then let cool.

Ferment and bottle

  1. Add sliced oranges, lemon, and dissolved yeast.

  2. Let stand for three weeks, then strain and bottle.

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. Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  2. Dandelion + lemontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together57 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Dandelion + orangetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together31 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Sugar + orangetop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,212 recipes

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

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Dandelion blossoms
Provide the main floral flavour and aroma of the tonic.
Sugar
Dissolves to sweeten the tonic and feeds the yeast during fermentation.
Yeast
Ferments the sugar, producing gas and alcohol that give the drink its character.
Oranges
Add citrus acidity and aroma to balance the sweetness.
Lemon
Adds bright acidity that sharpens the overall flavour.

The step that matters

Dissolving the sugar fully before cooling. Sugar must dissolve completely in the hot water so the yeast can access it evenly during fermentation. Undissolved sugar can leave grainy pockets and uneven fermentation, and adding yeast to water that is still hot can kill it.

“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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