Skip to main content
Dessert

Lemon Sherbet

A chilled lemon dessert made with lemon slices, sugar, gelatin, water, and whipped egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Lemon Sherbet

Why it works: Sugar and gelatin are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,778 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Lemon Sherbet

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the lemon juice and sugar

  1. Peel and slice the lemons thinly, then cover with granulated sugar and let stand for 30 minutes.

  2. If the sugar hasn't dissolved, add a little water and squeeze the mixture through a cloth.

Make the base

  1. Dissolve the gelatin in a little cold water, then add boiling water to fully dissolve it.

  2. Stir the dissolved gelatin into the cold water, then add the lemon juice and sugar mixture, stirring well.

Finish and freeze

  1. Whip the egg whites to stiff peaks and fold them into the mixture.

  2. Taste and add more sugar if needed.

  3. Pour the mixture into an ice cream freezer and freeze as quickly as possible.

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. Sugar + gelatintop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,778 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

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

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

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

  4. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  5. Lemon + gelatintop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,215 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-pinene (pine, resin).

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

Lemons
Supply the juice and sharp acidity that defines the sherbet's flavor.
Granulated sugar
Sweetens the lemon juice and balances its acidity.
Gelatin
Sets the mixture and gives it a body that holds together when frozen.
Egg whites
Whipped to stiff peaks, they add lightness and airy texture when folded in.

The step that matters

Freeze as quickly as possible. Fast freezing keeps ice crystals small, giving a smooth texture rather than a coarse, grainy one.

Swap the lemon

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, gelatin, egg. 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.

You might also like

Lemon CakeLemon Cake228 recipesLemon IceLemon Ice147 recipesLemon CustardLemon Custard64 recipesLemon Water IceLemon Water Ice55 recipes