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Imperial Iced-punch

A chilled punch made with vanilla syrup, pineapple, citrus juices, liqueurs, champagne, and egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Orange and lemon 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 ↓

Imperial Iced-punch

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Pound the pineapple and let it infuse in the vanilla syrup for 1 hour.

  2. Add the zests and mace, then mix in the orange and lemon juice.

  3. Strain the mixture through a fine sieve.

Chill and finish

  1. Chill the mixture until it reaches 22 degrees on the syrup scale.

  2. Once smooth, fold in the egg whites and let it settle for 10 minutes.

  3. Gradually mix in the liqueurs combined with a little syrup.

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. Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

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

  2. Vanilla + pineappletop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together911 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

  3. Pineapple + orangetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,664 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

  4. Vanilla + orangetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,371 recipes

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

  5. Pineapple + champagnetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together97 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

Egg whites
Whipped foam adds a light, airy texture and a frothy top to the punch.
Vanilla syrup
Sweetens the punch and carries the pineapple and citrus flavours.
Pineapple
Infusing in the syrup adds fruity flavour and aroma to the base.
Orange juice
Adds acidity and bright citrus flavour to balance the sweetness.
Lemon juice
Adds sharp acidity that brightens the punch and balances the syrup.
Champagne
Adds bubbles and a dry, lively character to the finished punch.

The step that matters

Fold in the egg whites. Egg white proteins trap air and form a foam when gently folded in, giving the punch its light texture. Stirring too hard knocks the air out and makes the foam collapse.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (vanilla, syrup, pineapple, orange, lemon, cream, champagne):

  1. Peppermintfits better
  2. Cinnamonfits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against vanilla, syrup, pineapple, orange, lemon, cream, champagne. 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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