Name: Ratafia De Framboises
Ingredients: 1¼ pounds raspberry juice; ¼ pound cherry juice; 2 pounds sugar; 4 pints brandy

Why it works: Raspberry and cherry work together. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 192 recipes. Both carry damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Ratafia De Framboises

Ingredients

1¼ pounds raspberry juice
¼ pound cherry juice
2 pounds sugar
4 pints brandy

Directions

Boil raspberry juice and cherry juice with sugar until dissolved.
Add brandy to the mixture and stir well.
Let the mixture stand until it becomes clear.
Once clear, pour it into bottles.

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.

Raspberry + cherrytop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together192 recipes

Shared aroma: damascenone (apple, rose).
Raspberry + brandytop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together235 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-hex-3-en-1-ol (freshly cut grass green and herbaceous notes).
Cherry + brandytop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together300 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
Sugar + brandytop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together11,939 recipes

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

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,598 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Sugar and brandy barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 11,939 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

Raspberry juice: Provides the main fruit flavour and colour of the liqueur.
Cherry juice: Adds extra fruit flavour and depth to the raspberry base.
Sugar: Sweetens the liqueur and balances the acidity of the fruit juices.
Brandy: Acts as the spirit base that preserves the liqueur and carries its aroma.