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Sage, Balm, or Rosemary Tea

A herbal tea made by infusing sage, balm, and rosemary leaves in boiling water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Sage and rosemary match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 465 recipes. Both carry 1,8-cineol, which smells eucalyptus, camphor. The science ↓

Sage, Balm, or Rosemary Tea

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Infuse a handful of the leaves in boiling water for 10 to 15 minutes.

  2. Decant the liquid in the usual manner.

  3. Sweeten with sugar if desired.

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. Sage + rosemarytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together465 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1,8-cineol (eucalyptus, camphor).

  2. Rosemary + sugartop 34% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together568 recipes

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

  3. Sage + sugartop 37% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together538 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

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

What each ingredient does

Sage leaves
Provides the main aromatic flavour of the tea.
Balm leaves
Adds a light, lemony aroma to the infusion.
Rosemary leaves
Contributes a resinous, piney aroma to the infusion.

Swap the sage

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rosemary, sugar):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Oreganofits about as well
  3. Sagethe original
  4. Marjoramfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against rosemary, sugar. 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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