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Spiced Vinegar

A vinegar infused with herbs and spices, made by macerating leaves and roots in alcohol and acetic acid.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Rosemary and sage match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 465 recipes. Both carry 1,8-cineol, which smells eucalyptus, camphor. The science ↓

Spiced Vinegar

Ingredients

Directions

Macerate the aromatics

  1. Macerate the geranium, lavender, peppermint, rosemary, and sage leaves in ½ cup of alcohol for two weeks.

  2. Macerate the angelica root, calamus root, camphor, mace, nutmeg, and cloves in 2 pounds of glacial acetic acid for two weeks.

Combine and season

  1. Mix the two liquids together and filter them into a bottle, leaving some space at the top.

  2. Allow the mixture to season in the bottle for a finer aroma.

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. Rosemary + sagetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together465 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1,8-cineol (eucalyptus, camphor).

  2. Peppermint + rosemarytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together118 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  3. Rosemary + angelicatop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together32 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  4. Sage + angelicatop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  5. Peppermint + sagetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together41 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Glacial acetic acid
Provides the sharp acidic base that draws out and carries the root and spice flavours.
Alcohol
Acts as a solvent that extracts aromatic compounds from the leaves.
Cloves
Contributes strong, warm aromatic oils that flavour the vinegar.
Nutmeg
Adds warm, sweet-spiced aroma to the finished vinegar.
Mace
Adds a delicate warm aroma that complements the nutmeg.

The step that matters

Macerating for the full two weeks. Aromatic compounds dissolve slowly into the alcohol and acetic acid. Cutting the maceration short leaves the vinegar weak in aroma, so the full two weeks lets the flavours build.

Swap the calamus

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (geranium, lavender, peppermint, rosemary, sage, angelica, camphor):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Clovefits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Calamusthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against geranium, lavender, peppermint, rosemary, sage, angelica, camphor. 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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