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Drink

Claret Cup

A chilled alcoholic beverage made with claret, sherry, brandy, noyeau, Maraschino, lemon rind, sugar, and seltzer.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and borage match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 102 recipes. Both carry acetic acid, which smells sour, vinegar. The science ↓

Claret Cup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. In a large jug, combine the claret, lemon rind, and 1 to 2 tablespoons of caster sugar.

  2. Cover the jug and let it chill in ice for 1 hour.

Finish and serve

  1. Add the remaining ingredients and stir gently.

  2. Serve chilled, optionally garnished with strips of cucumber peel.

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 + boragetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together102 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  2. Sherry + brandytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,209 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Sherry + boragetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

  4. Sherry + lemontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,273 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  5. Brandy + boragetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together72 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Claret
Forms the wine base that gives the punch its body and main flavour.
Sherry
Adds dryness and a nutty depth that layers with the wine.
Brandy
Adds warmth and alcohol strength, rounding out the wine.
Seltzer or soda water
Adds carbonation, making the drink lighter and livelier when diluted.

The step that matters

Stir gently after adding the seltzer. Carbonated water loses its fizz quickly when agitated, so stirring it in gently and serving promptly keeps the drink sparkling.

Swap the borage

The recipe marks borage as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sherry, brandy, lemon, sugar):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Boragethe original
  3. Nutmegfits about as well
  4. Gingerfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against sherry, brandy, lemon, sugar. 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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