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Dessert

Compound Powder of Cinnamon

A blend of cinnamon, ginger, cardamom, and nutmeg powders.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Compound Powder of Cinnamon

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Combine all the powders in a bowl and rub them together until thoroughly mixed.

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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cinnamon + cardamomtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,299 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Ginger + cardamomtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,114 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Cinnamon + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Cardamom + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together249 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

What each ingredient does

Cinnamon powder
Provides the warm, sweet aroma that defines the blend.
Ginger powder
Adds a warm, peppery aroma and a spicy bite to the blend.
Cardamom powder
Contributes a floral, citrusy aroma that rounds out the spice mix.
Nutmeg powder
Adds a sweet, woody aroma that deepens the warmth of the blend.

Swap the ginger

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cinnamon, cardamom, nutmeg):

  1. Clovefits better
  2. Allspicefits better
  3. Turmericfits about as well
  4. Gingerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cinnamon, cardamom, nutmeg. 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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