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Drink

A Most Pleasant Drink

A warm cranberry drink made with water, oatmeal, lemon peel, sugar, sherry, egg, milk, rose water, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,318 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

A Most Pleasant Drink

Ingredients

Directions

Make the punch

  1. Mash the cranberries in a cup of water.

  2. Boil 2 quarts of water with 1 tablespoon of oatmeal and a bit of lemon peel.

  3. Add the mashed cranberries and sugar to the boiling water, adjusting sugar to maintain the fruit's flavor.

  4. Stir in ¼ cup of sherry and boil for 30 minutes.

  5. Strain the mixture.

Finish and serve

  1. Beat the fresh egg and mix it with ¼ cup of warm milk, 1 tablespoon of capillaire, 1 tablespoon of rose water, and a little grated nutmeg.

  2. Do not warm the mixture after adding the egg.

  3. Consume it first and last thing.

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. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Lemon + rosetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,174 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Sherry + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,479 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3,5-trimethylpyrazine (cocoa, roasted).

  4. Rose + nutmegtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Lemon + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Cranberries
Provide tart fruit flavor and colour to the punch.
Fresh egg
Adds body and a rich, creamy texture to the finished drink.
Sherry
Adds fortified wine flavour and aroma to the punch.
Warm milk
Softens the drink and mellows its sharp fruit and wine notes.

The step that matters

Do not warm the mixture after adding the egg. Heating after the egg is added can cook it, causing it to curdle and turn grainy, which spoils the smooth texture of the punch.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lemon, sugar, sherry, egg, milk, rose):

  1. Cinnamonfits about as well
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Marjoramfits less well
  4. Thymefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against lemon, sugar, sherry, egg, milk, rose. 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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