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Cinnamon Cordial

A spiced alcoholic cordial made with cinnamon, cassia, orange oil, caraway, sugar, and isinglass.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Cassia and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 116 recipes. Both carry cinnamyl acetate, which smells sweet aromatic, cinnamon. The science ↓

Cinnamon Cordial

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Combine 2 gallons of spirits with 1.5 grams of cassia oil, 0.5 grams of orange oil, and 0.5 ounces of pounded cinnamon in a large container.

  2. Add 2 pounds of loaf sugar and 2 drops of caraway oil to the mixture.

  3. Color the mixture with burnt sugar until the desired color is achieved.

  4. Fine the mixture with isinglass until it is clear.

  5. Once clear, bottle the cordial or transfer it to a small cask.

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. Cassia + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together116 recipes

    Shared aroma: cinnamyl acetate (sweet aromatic, cinnamon).

  2. Cinnamon + carawaytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together188 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Cinnamon + sugartop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Spirit + cinnamontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together150 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Cassia + carawaytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

Cinnamon and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Cassia oil
Provides the main warm, spicy cinnamon aroma that defines the cordial.
Orange oil
Adds a bright citrus aroma that lifts the spice flavour.
Loaf sugar
Adds sweetness and body, balancing the strong spice and alcohol.
Pounded cinnamon
Adds additional cinnamon flavour and aroma from the ground bark.

The step that matters

Fining with isinglass. Isinglass is a collagen-based fining agent that binds suspended particles so they settle out. Adding too little leaves the cordial cloudy, while waiting until it is fully clear before bottling prevents sediment from carrying into the bottle.

Swap the caraway

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (spirit, cassia, orange oil, cinnamon, sugar):

  1. Clovefits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Gingerfits better
  4. Carawaythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against spirit, cassia, orange oil, cinnamon, 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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