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Black Raspberry Shrub

A sweetened vinegar beverage made from raspberries, vinegar, sugar, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Vinegar and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 20,806 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Black Raspberry Shrub

Ingredients

Directions

Make the shrub base

  1. Combine 3 quarts of raspberries with 1 pint of vinegar.

  2. Let the mixture stand for 24 hours.

  3. Strain the mixture.

Cook and seal

  1. Add 1 pound of sugar for each pint of liquid.

  2. Simmer for 30 minutes.

  3. Skim off any impurities.

  4. Seal the mixture while hot.

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. Vinegar + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Raspberries
Provide the main fruit flavor and color, and the juice that forms the shrub.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that gives the shrub its tart, sharp character and helps preserve it.
Sugar
Balances the vinegar's sharpness with sweetness and helps preserve the finished syrup.

The step that matters

Simmer after adding the sugar. Sugar must dissolve fully into the warm acidic liquid before sealing. Simmering for the full time helps it dissolve and thickens the syrup, while skimming removes foam and impurities that could spoil the shrub.

“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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