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Drink

Arrow-root

A simple beverage made by dissolving arrowroot in boiling water, sweetened and optionally thickened with milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Arrow-root

Why it works: Milk and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,053 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Arrow-root

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wet the arrow-root in a little cold water with the coarse sea salt.

Make the drink

  1. Pour the boiling water over the mixture, stirring quickly.

  2. Set it to boil for one minute.

Finish

  1. Sweeten to taste and add milk if desired.

  2. Thin it out and add lemon juice and sugar.

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.

  1. Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

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

Arrow-root
Thickens the drink as its starch swells and gelatinizes in hot liquid.
Sugar
Adds sweetness, adjusted to taste.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity and a bright flavour.

The step that matters

Pouring the boiling water while stirring quickly. Arrowroot starch clumps when hot liquid hits it unevenly. Wetting it in cold water first and stirring quickly as the boiling water goes in spreads the granules, so they swell and thicken smoothly rather than forming lumps.

Swap the lemon

The recipe marks lemon as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, milk):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Peachfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, milk. 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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