Name: Ratafia De Noix
Ingredients: green walnuts; 5 pints brandy; 1 pound sugar; 1 ounce cinnamon; 1 ounce cloves; nutmeg, grated

Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg 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 ↓

Ratafia De Noix

Ingredients

Directions

Crush the green walnuts.
Steep them in a jar covered tightly with brandy, sugar, cinnamon, cloves, and grated nutmeg for two months.
After two months, strain and filter the mixture before bottling.

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.

Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together11,917 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together14,189 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together8,686 recipes

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

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,230 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Walnut + cinnamontop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,147 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Green walnuts: Provide the main flavour base, releasing their bitter, astringent character into the spirit as they steep.
Brandy: Acts as the solvent that extracts flavour from the walnuts and spices, and preserves the liqueur.
Sugar: Adds sweetness that balances the bitterness of the walnuts and the spirit's strength.
Cinnamon: Contributes warm, sweet aroma to the finished liqueur.
Cloves: Add a pungent, warm aroma that deepens the spiced character of the liqueur.

Swap the walnut

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

Almondfits better
Chestnutfits better
Pistachiofits about as well
Walnutthe original

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