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Drink

Cherry Beer , or Bed Barley Wine

A fermented beverage made by adding molasses, ground logwood, and almond cake to beer.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Beer and almond work together. They rank in the top 24% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 42 recipes. Both carry 3-methylbutanol, which smells malty, whiskey. The science ↓

Cherry Beer , or Bed Barley Wine

Ingredients

Directions

Mix

  1. Add the molasses, ground logwood, and almond cake to the barrel of beer.

  2. Stir well with a long stick inserted through the bung-hole.

  3. Agitate the cask for two to three days.

Settle and serve

  1. Let it stand to settle, then draw or bottle it off for use.

  2. Serve hot, sweeten with sugar and spices if desired.

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. Beer + almondtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-methylbutanol (malty, whiskey).

  2. Molasses + almondtop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together402 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Beer + molassestop 32% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together55 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Molasses
Adds sweetness and dark color to the beer.
Ground logwood
Provides the red color and astringent body characteristic of this drink.
Almond cake
Adds a nutty aroma and flavor to the beer.
New table beer or small ale
Forms the base liquid that the other ingredients flavor and color.

The step that matters

Agitating the cask for two to three days. Stirring and agitation keep the dense molasses, logwood, and almond cake evenly dispersed in the beer; if they settle unevenly, flavor and color will vary from one draw to the next.

Swap the almond

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beer, molasses):

  1. Beansfits better
  2. Kidney beansfits about as well
  3. Walnutfits about as well
  4. Almondthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beer, molasses. 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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