Why it works: Orange and mint work together. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 549 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓
Mint Julep
Ingredients
Directions
Peel the orange and strain the juice into a tumbler.
Add the mint, sugar, and orange peel.
Fill the tumbler with small pieces of ice or iced water, leaving room for the gin.
Pour in the gin and stir gently.
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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Orange + minttop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together549 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Sugar + gintop 19% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together344 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Orange + sugartop 20% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together19,212 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Mint + gintop 21% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together46 recipes
Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).
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Orange + gintop 23% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together158 recipes
Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).
Orange and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 19,212 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
- Gin
- Provides the main spirit flavour and alcohol base of the drink.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the drink and helps balance the citrus and gin.
- Orange
- Adds acidity and bright citrus aroma from its juice and rind.
- Mint
- Adds a fresh, aromatic herbal note to the drink.
Swap the mint
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (orange, sugar, gin):
- Cinnamonfits better
- Gingerfits better
- Rosemaryfits better
- Mintthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against orange, sugar, gin. 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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