Why it works: Orange and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓
Verder, or Milk Punch
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the peels
Peel the oranges and lemons as thin as possible.
Grate the peels with sugar to extract the flavor.
Steep the peels in a bottle of rum or brandy for 24 hours.
Make the punch
Squeeze the fruit into a bowl with 2 pounds of sugar.
Add 4 quarts of water and 1 quart of boiling hot milk to the mixture.
Stir in the rum or brandy.
Strain through a jelly bag until clear.
Bottle and cork immediately.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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.
-
Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together10,634 recipes
Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
-
Milk + rumtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together967 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).
-
Orange + rumtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together801 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
-
Sugar + rumtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,908 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
-
Lemon + milktop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together19,053 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Milk
- Curdles with the citrus acid, which clarifies the punch as it is strained.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the punch and draws flavor out of the peels.
- Rum or brandy
- Extracts and carries the citrus oils and aroma while acting as a preservative.
The step that matters
Adding the boiling hot milk. Milk must be added while very hot so its proteins curdle and bind impurities. Those solids are then removed when the punch is strained, leaving it clear.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (orange, sugar, milk, rum):
- Vanillafits better
- Pineapplefits better
- Mangofits better
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against orange, sugar, milk, rum. 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.
More milk punch recipes
You might also like
Orange Syrup47 recipes
Lemon Whey33 recipes
Lemon Wine31 recipes
Orange Water Ice28 recipesThe free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.