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Drink

Bqo Flip

A flip made with ale, eggs, butter, brandy, sugar, nutmeg, ginger, and optional cloves.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,686 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Bqo Flip

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Boil 3 quarts of ale with a little nutmeg.

  2. Beat 6 eggs and mix them with a little cold ale.

  3. Pour in some of the hot ale and return it several times to prevent curdling; stir well.

  4. Add a piece of butter, brandy, sugar, nutmeg, and ginger to taste.

  5. Optionally, add a few cloves for extra flavor.

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. Nutmeg + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Ginger + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Nutmeg + gingertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,324 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Brandy + clovetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,362 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  5. Nutmeg + brandytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,311 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Thicken the drink into a creamy, foamy body as they set gently in the hot ale.
Ale
Forms the base liquid and carries the warm, malty flavor of the whole drink.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, silky mouthfeel to the flip.
Brandy
Adds a warming alcohol note that lifts the aroma of the spices.

The step that matters

Pour in some of the hot ale and return it several times. Adding hot ale to the eggs too quickly can scramble them. Pouring in portions and returning the mixture to the pot, while stirring, gradually warms the eggs so they thicken smoothly instead of curdling.

Swap the clove

The recipe marks clove as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (nutmeg, egg, butter, brandy, sugar, ginger):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Clovethe original
  3. Allspicefits about as well
  4. Cardamomfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against nutmeg, egg, butter, brandy, sugar, ginger. 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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