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Drink

Pineapple Punch

A citrus and pineapple punch sweetened with sugar, flavored with tea, brandy, rum, champagne, and a liqueur.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Pineapple Punch

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 ↓

Pineapple Punch

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Shave the outer skins of the lemons into the sugar.

  2. Squeeze the juice from the lemons and oranges into the sugar.

  3. Pour in the syrup from the pineapple.

  4. Simmer the pineapple slices in 1 quart of water for 10 minutes, then pour over the sugar mixture.

  5. Add the remaining 1 quart of water and simmer for 20 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Finish and serve

  1. Strain the mixture into a vessel and add the brandy, rum, and other ingredients.

  2. When cold, add a 10-pound lump of clear ice if using immediately; otherwise, add it just before serving.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Pineapple + rumtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

  3. Rum + champagnetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together137 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

  4. Brandy + rumtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,058 recipes

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

  5. Brandy + champagnetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together169 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

What each ingredient does

Lemons
Their juice and peel provide acidity and aromatic oils that balance the sugar.
Sugar
Sweetens the punch and, dissolved with the juice, helps extract flavour from the peel.
Pineapple
Adds fruit sweetness, acidity and body through its juice and simmered slices.
Brandy
Adds alcohol and warm aromatic depth that carries the fruit flavours.
Rum
Adds alcohol and molasses-toned sweetness that rounds out the citrus.

The step that matters

Simmering the pineapple and water. Simmering pineapple slices for a set time softens them and draws out flavour; overcooking can dull fresh fruit aroma and make the syrup taste cooked. Keep the time as written and stir so the sugar dissolves evenly.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (orange, pineapple, sugar, green tea, brandy, rum, champagne):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Apricotfits better
  3. Peachfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against orange, pineapple, sugar, green tea, brandy, rum, champagne. 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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