☠️ Poison Pantry 1907

Domestic Peach Brandy

The stones from a peck of peaches, steeped two months in brandy.

From: Fruit Recipes
Published: 1907
Yikes Scale: Call poison control

Exactly as printed, 1907

Make with two gallons French brandy to one gallon well flavoured peaches, skinned and mashed. Add to this the pits from a peck of the fruit and let stand two months, when filter and bottle.

Fruit Recipes, 1907. Public domain; transcription unaltered.

So what happens if I make it?

Peach kernels contain amygdalin, which breaks down into hydrogen cyanide and benzaldehyde in the presence of water and the kernel's own enzymes. Two months in spirit is a long, thorough extraction.

A peck is ten to twelve pounds of fruit, so four or five dozen stones, on top of the mashed peaches already in the jar. The instruction to filter removes solids and nothing else.

Notes from the 21st century

Benzaldehyde is why anyone does this. It is the almond note that makes stone-fruit liqueurs taste of stone fruit. It arrives in the same reaction as the cyanide.
Modern noyaux use very few kernels. Where the tradition survives, it is a handful, not a peck, and commercial producers work to an assay.
The peaches themselves are not the issue. Skinned and mashed fruit in brandy is just fruit brandy. Everything alarming here is in the pits.

Don't take our word for it. The complete book is online, free and searchable.

Read the original page →

Domestic Peach Brandy

Exactly as printed, 1907

So what happens if I make it?

Notes from the 21st century

More from the Poison Pantry

Bilious Cholic (opium-turpentine cordial)

Beer of Sulphuric Acid

Bonbons cast in leaden moulds