Name: Oxymel of Garlic
Ingredients: ¼ ounce carraway seeds; ¼ ounce sweet fennel seeds; ½ pint vinegar; 1½ ounces garlic, sliced; ½ pound clarified honey

Why it works: Fennel and garlic match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 969 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Oxymel of Garlic

Ingredients

Directions

Boil carraway and fennel seeds in vinegar in a glazed earthen vessel.
After a short boil, add sliced garlic and cover tightly.
Let the mixture cool.
Express the liquor and mix it with clarified honey in a boiling water bath.

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.

Fennel + garlictop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together969 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Vinegar + honeytop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,586 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Vinegar + garlictop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together9,115 recipes

Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
Fennel + honeytop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together99 recipes

Shared aroma: 4-methoxybenzaldehyde (sweet, anise).
Fennel + vinegartop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together505 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).