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To Make Coffee

A method for brewing coffee using boiling water and isinglass chips.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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To Make Coffee

Why it works: Cream and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

To Make Coffee

Ingredients

Directions

Brew

  1. Put the coffee into a coffee pot.

  2. Pour boiling water over the coffee.

  3. Boil for 6 minutes.

  4. Pour out a cupful 2-3 times and return it to the pot.

Clarify and settle

  1. Add isinglass chips and pour 1 large spoonful of boiling water on it.

  2. Boil for 5 more minutes.

  3. Set the pot by the fire to keep hot for 10 minutes.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Coffee + creamtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,339 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

  3. Coffee + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,344 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Fresh ground coffee
Provides the main flavour and aroma of the brew.
Isinglass chips
Acts as a fining agent that gathers fine particles so the coffee settles clearer.

The step that matters

Returning the poured-out coffee to the pot. Pouring the coffee back and forth mixes the grounds through the liquid and helps extract flavour evenly, while the isinglass later needs the brew to be settled rather than churned.

“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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