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Drink

Balm Wine

A fermented drink made with water, sugar, yeast, balm, lemon, Seville orange, brandy, and wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Balm Wine

Why it works: Lemon and orange 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 ↓

Balm Wine

Ingredients

Directions

Make the syrup

  1. Boil the water and sugar together and skim well.

  2. Let it cool.

  3. Add yeast and let it work.

Flavour and barrel

  1. Slice the lemon and Seville orange.

  2. Add them along with the balm to the mixture.

  3. Transfer to a barrel and add the brandy.

  4. Stop it up well.

  5. Let it stand for six weeks before bottling.

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 + orangetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  2. Brandy + winetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,427 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  3. Lemon + winetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,157 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Orange + winetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,046 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Orange + brandytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,706 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

What each ingredient does

Lump sugar
Provides sweetness and the sugar that yeast ferments into alcohol.
Yeast
Ferments the sugar, producing alcohol and carbon dioxide to drive the wine.
Brandy
Raises the alcohol content, adding strength and preserving the finished wine.
Balm
Contributes aroma and a subtle herbal flavour to the wine.
Seville orange
Adds acidity and aromatic citrus flavour.

The step that matters

Let it work after adding yeast. Yeast needs the cooled liquid to be warm but not hot enough to kill it. Adding yeast to a hot mixture can stop fermentation before it starts, so the wine may not ferment properly.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, orange, brandy, wine):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Apricotfits about as well
  3. Applefits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, orange, brandy, wine. 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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