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Lemon Ginger Punch

A citrus and ginger flavored punch made with lemon juice, sugar, water, ginger ale, ice, and mint.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and mint are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,998 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Lemon Ginger Punch

Ingredients

Directions

Make the lemon base

  1. Slice the lemons and mix them with the sugar in a bowl.

  2. Let the mixture sit for 1 hour.

  3. Add the water to the lemon and sugar mixture.

Assemble and serve

  1. Combine the lemonade with the ginger ale in a punch bowl.

  2. Add ice to the punch bowl.

  3. Bruise the mint stems and lower leaves to release their flavor.

  4. Add the bruised mint to the punch 30 minutes before serving.

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. Lemon + minttop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,998 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Ginger + minttop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together647 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + gingertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together14,054 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

  5. Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

Sugar and ginger barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 14,054 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

Lemons
Provide the primary acidity and citrus aroma, and their oils release as the sugar draws out juice.
Sugar
Sweetens the punch and draws juice and oils out of the sliced lemons.
Ginger ale
Adds sweetness, carbonation and a gingery flavor to the finished punch.
Fresh mint
Adds a fresh aromatic herbal note that bruising helps release.

The step that matters

Bruise the mint gently and add it late. Bruising releases aromatic oils from the leaves, but over-bruising or long steeping can make mint taste bitter or grassy. Adding it about 30 minutes before serving keeps the flavor fresh and bright.

Swap the mint

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

  1. Cardamomfits better
  2. Cinnamonfits better
  3. Turmericfits better
  4. Mintthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lemon, sugar, ginger. 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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