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Drink

Koumiss

Milk beer is a fermented beverage made from cow milk, buttermilk, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Buttermilk and sugar match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,973 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Koumiss

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mixture

  1. In a bowl, combine 1 quart of new milk with ½ cup of fresh buttermilk and 3-4 lumps of white sugar.

  2. Mix well until the sugar dissolves.

  3. Place the mixture in a warm spot for 10 hours until it thickens.

  4. Pour the mixture from one vessel to another until smooth and uniform.

Bottle and ferment

  1. Bottle the koumiss and keep it in a warm place for 24 to 36 hours.

  2. Ensure the bottles are tightly corked and the corks are tied down.

  3. Shake well for 5 minutes before opening.

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. Buttermilk + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,973 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

  3. Milk + buttermilktop 41% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together9 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

New milk
Provides the liquid base and proteins that thicken and ferment into the drink.
Fresh buttermilk
Adds live cultures that start the fermentation and sourness.
White sugar
Feeds the fermentation and adds sweetness to the finished drink.

The step that matters

Keeping the bottles tightly corked. Fermentation gives off carbon dioxide, and a loose cork lets it escape, so the drink stays flat. A sealed bottle holds the gas, which produces the fizz. Shaking before opening mixes the gas back into the liquid.

“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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