Name: Orange-Raisin Wine
Ingredients: 30 pounds new Malaga raisins; 20 large Seville oranges; 8 gallons soft water; 1 pound white sugar

Why it works: Raisin and orange are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,684 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Orange-Raisin Wine

Ingredients

30 pounds new Malaga raisins
20 large Seville oranges
8 gallons soft water
1 pound white sugar

Directions

Prepare the fruit

Pick and chop the raisins clean.
Pare 10 oranges thinly for preserving.
Boil 8 gallons of soft water until reduced by a third, then let it cool slightly.
Pour 5 gallons of hot water over the raisins and orange peel, stir well, and cover.
When cool, let it stand for 5 days, stirring once or twice daily.

Strain and add flavour

Strain through a fine sieve, pressing as dry as possible.
Transfer to a suitable container and add the rinds of the remaining 10 oranges, cut thin.
Make a syrup with the juice of 20 oranges and 1 pound of sugar the day before bottling.

Clear and bottle

Stir the syrup into the mixture, seal it, and let it stand for 2 months to clear.
Bottle the wine; it will keep for 3 years.

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.

Raisin + orangetop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,684 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Raisin + sugartop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together12,481 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Orange + sugartop 20% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together19,212 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

New malaga raisins: Supply the main sugars and fruit flavour that ferment into the wine.
Seville oranges: Add acidity, aroma and bitter citrus flavour from juice and rind.
White sugar: Sweetens the syrup and feeds the fermentation for body and alcohol.