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Drink

Citron Cream

Citron Cream is a liqueur made by infusing citrons in brandy and water, then distilling and sweetening with sugar syrup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and syrup match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,842 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Citron Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Infuse

  1. Zest the citrons and place them in a jar with the brandy and water.

  2. Cork the jar and let it infuse for several days.

Distill and finish

  1. Distill the mixture using a bain marie until you have 18 pints.

  2. Dissolve the sugar in 14 pints of water to make a syrup.

  3. Combine the syrup with the distilled spirit and filter through a bag or cloth.

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. Sugar + syruptop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,842 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Brandy + sugartop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together11,939 recipes

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

  3. Brandy + syruptop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together561 recipes

Brandy and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 11,939 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

Citrons
Their zest supplies the main citrus aroma and flavour that the infused spirit carries.
Brandy
Acts as the solvent that extracts flavour from the citrus zest during infusion.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and body, balancing the alcohol in the finished liqueur.

The step that matters

Distill using a bain marie. A gentle, indirect heat keeps the mixture from scorching and holds the distillate at a controlled temperature, preserving delicate citrus aromas. Distilling until 18 pints is reached sets the final volume and strength of the spirit.

“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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