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Strawberry Wine

A fermented beverage made from strawberries, water, sugar, tartar, citrus, and brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and orange 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 ↓

Strawberry Wine

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash and prepare the strawberries.

  2. In a large container, combine strawberries and water.

  3. Add sugar and stir until dissolved.

Ferment and bottle

  1. Mix in red tartar, lemon juice, lemon peel, orange juice, and orange peel.

  2. Allow the mixture to ferment for several weeks.

  3. After fermentation, add brandy and bottle the wine.

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. Lemon + orangetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

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

  2. Orange + brandytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,706 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + brandytop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together11,939 recipes

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

  5. Sugar + orangetop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,212 recipes

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

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Strawberries
Provide the main fruit flavor and aroma for the wine.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast during fermentation, producing alcohol and carbon dioxide.
Brandy
Added after fermentation to raise the alcohol content and strengthen the wine.
Red tartar
Adds acidity, which brightens flavor and helps keep the wine stable.

The step that matters

Allow the mixture to ferment for several weeks. Fermentation converts sugar into alcohol and carbon dioxide through yeast activity. The wine needs enough time for sugar to be consumed, otherwise it can taste sweet or continue fermenting after bottling.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, orange, brandy):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Apricotfits better
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, orange, brandy. 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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