Name: Excelsior Syrup
Ingredients: 1 pint plain syrup; 4 oz syrup of wild cherry bark; 4 oz port wine

Why it works: Cherry and port wine work together. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 21 recipes. Both carry ethyl pentanoate, which smells yeast, fruit. The science ↓

Excelsior Syrup

Ingredients

1 pint plain syrup
4 oz syrup of wild cherry bark
4 oz port wine

Directions

Pour 1 pint of plain syrup into a bottle.
Add 4 oz each of syrup of wild cherry bark and port wine.
Mix well and use as required.

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.

Cherry + port winetop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together21 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl pentanoate (yeast, fruit).
Syrup + cherrytop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together339 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Syrup + port winetop 25% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together36 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).