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Cowslip Wine

A fermented wine made with cowslip pips, citrus rinds, herbs, and optional brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Cowslip 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 ↓

Cowslip Wine

Ingredients

Directions

Make the syrup

  1. Boil the sugar and water for 30 minutes with the balm, borage, and sweet briar.

  2. Once cool, remove the herbs.

Ferment

  1. Pour the liquid into a cask.

  2. Add the lemon juice and rind, orange juice and rind, and cowslip pips.

  3. Stir the mixture daily for one week.

  4. Add a toast dipped in yeast.

  5. Let the mixture ferment for one week.

  6. If using more sugar, allow fermentation for two weeks to skip the brandy.

  7. Add the brandy.

  8. Seal the cask.

  9. Let it stand for two months.

  10. Bottle the wine for use.

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. Borage + lemontop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together102 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  3. Borage + orangetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together32 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

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

  5. Borage + brandytop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together72 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Lump sugar
Provides the sugar that yeast ferments into alcohol, and sweetness in the finished wine.
Lemons
Add acidity and aroma from the juice and rind, balancing the sweetness.
Oranges
Add sweetness, acidity and aroma from the juice and rind.
Cowslip pips
Provide the flower flavour that defines the wine.

The step that matters

Let the mixture ferment before adding the brandy. Fermentation must finish before brandy is added, because brandy stops yeast activity and would leave the wine sweet and unfinished. Sealing the cask afterward lets the wine mature without extra air.

Swap the borage

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Gingerfits better
  3. Nutmegfits about as well
  4. Boragethe original

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