Why it works: Sugar and ginger are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,054 recipes. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓
Sparkling Aerated Ginger Ale
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the water
Pour 4 gallons of clear soft water into a clean cask or earthenware pan with a wooden tap inserted about 1 inch from the bottom.
Mix in 6 oz of carbonate of soda and let it stand for 12 hours to settle.
Carefully draw off the liquid into another tub using the tap, avoiding the sediment.
Flavor and bottle
Dissolve 2 lbs of loaf sugar in the liquid and flavor with extract of ginger ale.
Color the mixture with burnt sugar or liquid coloring as desired.
Fill glass lemonade bottles with the mixture, adding 2 scruples of crystal tartaric acid to each bottle.
Immediately drive in the cork and secure it with wire.
After 1 hour, or when the acid is dissolved, the ale is ready to use.
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.
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Sugar + gingertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together14,054 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
Sugar and ginger barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 14,054 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
- Carbonate of soda
- Reacts with the tartaric acid later to release carbon dioxide, which makes the ale fizz.
- Crystal tartaric acid
- Reacts with the carbonate of soda to produce carbon dioxide bubbles and a sharp, tart taste.
- Loaf sugar
- Adds sweetness and body to the liquid.
- Extract of ginger ale
- Provides the main ginger aroma and flavor.
The step that matters
Corking immediately after adding the tartaric acid. Once the acid meets the carbonate, carbon dioxide forms quickly, and it stays dissolved only if the bottle is sealed at once. Delay lets the gas escape and leaves the ale flat.
“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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