Why it works: Malt and beer work together. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 55 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓
Strong Beer or Ale
Ingredients
Directions
Mash
Pour hot water (not boiling) over the malt and let it infuse for 3 hours, covered.
Mash the mixture in the first half hour and let it stand for the remaining time.
Run the wort over the previously infused hops.
Boil and ferment
Boil the mixture for 2 hours after it begins to boil.
Cool a pailful of the wort and add 3 quarts of yeast, preparing it for the rest when ready the next day.
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.
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Malt + beertop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together55 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Hops + beertop 42% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together0 recipes
Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, fruity).
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Malt + hopstop 49% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together1 recipe
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Malt
- Provides the sugars that yeast later ferments into alcohol.
- Hops
- Add bitterness and aroma that balance the sweetness of the malt.
- Yeast
- Ferments the sugars in the wort, producing alcohol and carbon dioxide.
The step that matters
Cool the pailful of wort before adding yeast. Yeast is killed by high heat, so the wort must be cooled to a temperature the yeast can tolerate before it is added. Adding yeast to hot wort can stop fermentation before it starts.
“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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