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Egg Flip

A frothy alcoholic beverage made with eggs, sugar, spices, ale, and rum or brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Egg Flip

Why it works: Lemon and ginger match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,154 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Egg Flip

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Prepare the spice mix by combining grated lemon rind, ginger, and nutmeg.

  2. Beat the eggs with the sugar and the spice mix in a jug.

Heat and combine

  1. Heat the ale in a pot until just before boiling.

  2. Pour the ale into another jug, then pour it back into the first jug, alternating until smooth.

  3. Add the rum or brandy to the egg mixture and stir well.

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.

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.

  1. Lemon + gingertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,154 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Ginger + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,324 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Nutmeg + rumtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together646 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  5. Ginger + rumtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together229 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Provide structure and body, thickening the drink as they are blended with the hot ale.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the sharpness of the spices and alcohol.
Home-brewed ale
Forms the liquid base and carries the flavour of the drink.
Rum or brandy
Adds spirit strength and warming aroma to the finished drink.

The step that matters

Alternating the hot ale between jugs. Pouring the hot ale back and forth aerates and gently warms the beaten eggs. Pouring too fast or without mixing can scramble the eggs or leave the drink lumpy, so it should be stirred until smooth.

Swap the ginger

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, sugar, lemon, nutmeg, rum):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Allspicefits about as well
  4. Gingerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, lemon, nutmeg, 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.

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