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Dessert

Posset

Posset is a milk-based dessert made by boiling milk with cinnamon, soaking bread, and mixing with ale or wine, nutmeg, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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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 ↓

Posset

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the milk

  1. Heat the milk with the cinnamon stick in a wide-mouthed kettle until it boils.

  2. Place the slice of bread on top of the boiling milk and let it boil for 1–2 minutes.

  3. Remove the kettle from heat and set aside to soften the bread.

Assemble and serve

  1. In a bowl, combine the ale or white wine with nutmeg and sugar.

  2. Bring the milk to a boil again.

  3. Lift out the bread and place it in the bowl with the ale or wine.

  4. Gently pour the boiling milk over the bread and 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.

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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Cinnamon + sugartop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  5. Bread + nutmegtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,997 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

Cinnamon and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Milk
Forms the body of the drink and, when boiled, curdles with the ale or wine to give it a thick texture.
Bread
Soaks up liquid and softens, adding body and a soft, absorbent texture to the drink.
Strong ale or white wine
Provides acidity and alcohol that curdle the hot milk, giving the posset its characteristic tang.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the sharpness of the ale or wine.

The step that matters

Pouring the boiling milk over the bread and ale. The milk must be hot enough to curdle when it meets the acidic ale or wine. Pouring gently keeps the curds from breaking up and keeps the drink smooth and separated into a clear whey beneath.

“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.

More posset recipes

Ale 23Treacle 21Sack 19Wine 9Molasses 5Lemon 4 See all 14 →

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