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Drink

Roman Punch

A citrus-based punch made with lemon and orange juice, sugar, egg whites, and rum or whisky.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Roman 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 ↓

Roman Punch

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fruit

  1. Roll the lemons and oranges on a table to release their juices.

  2. Peel the yellow rinds and add them to a gallon of water.

Make the syrup

  1. Boil the mixture until it reduces to 3 quarts.

  2. Remove the rinds and dissolve 3 pounds of sugar in the water.

  3. Let the mixture cool.

  4. Mix in the egg whites and bring to a boil again.

  5. Let it simmer for a while, then strain and cool.

Finish the punch

  1. Stir in the juice of the lemons and oranges, then gradually add 1 quart of rum or whisky.

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. Orange + rumtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together801 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + rumtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,908 recipes

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

  4. Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  5. Lemon + eggtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together44,316 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

Lemon and sugar 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

Egg whites
Coagulate and carry impurities to the surface, clarifying the liquid as it boils.
White sugar
Dissolves into the water to sweeten the punch and balance the citrus acidity.
Lemons
Supply the juice and acidity that give the punch its bright, sharp flavour.
Oranges
Add juice and sweetness, rounding out the citrus flavour.
Rum or whisky
Adds alcoholic strength and warm aroma to the punch.

The step that matters

Mix in the egg whites and bring to a boil again. Egg whites must be stirred in evenly before heating. As the mixture boils, the whites set and trap cloudy particles, which rise as a foam. Skimming and straining this removes the haze and leaves a clear punch.

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lemon, sugar, egg, rum):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Orangethe original
  3. Pineapplefits about as well
  4. Limefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against lemon, sugar, egg, rum. 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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