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Drink

Ginger Pop

A fermented ginger drink made with sugar, ginger, lemon, water, yeast, and optional egg white.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Ginger Pop

Why it works: Ginger and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,154 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Ginger Pop

Ingredients

Directions

Make the ginger mixture

  1. In a large container, combine the lump sugar, ginger, lemon juice, lemon zest, boiling water, and cream of tartar.

  2. Allow the mixture to cool.

  3. Add the yeast on a piece of toast.

  4. Let it stand for 12 hours.

Bottle and ferment

  1. Strain the mixture through a coarse cloth into bottles.

  2. Add the beaten white of one egg just before corking.

  3. Tie the corks down securely.

  4. Allow to ferment for 3 days.

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. Ginger + lemontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,154 recipes

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

  2. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + gingertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together14,054 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

  4. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  5. Ginger + creamtop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,137 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

Lump sugar
Provides the sugar that yeast ferments into carbonation and alcohol.
Yeast
Ferments the sugar, producing carbon dioxide that carbonates the drink.
Ginger
Adds the characteristic spicy aroma and flavour to the drink.
Lemons
Add acidity and bright citrus aroma from the juice and zest.
Cream of tartar
Adds acidity that helps stabilise the mixture and balance sweetness.

The step that matters

Tie the corks down securely. Fermentation produces carbon dioxide inside sealed bottles, so loose corks can let gas escape or let bottles build dangerous pressure. Securing them keeps the drink carbonated.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, ginger, cream):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Coconutfits about as well
  3. Lemonthe original
  4. Orangefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, ginger, cream. 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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