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Lemon Water Ice

A frozen dessert made from lemon zest, juice, water, syrup, and whipped egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Lemon Water Ice

Why it works: Lemon and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 19% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 44,316 recipes. Both carry (e,e)-2,4-decadienal, which smells fatty, deep fried. The science ↓

Lemon Water Ice

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the juice

  1. Zest every fourth lemon into a basin, then squeeze the juice from all the lemons into the same basin.

  2. Add water and syrup to taste, then strain the mixture through a fine sieve.

  3. Pour the mixture into a freezing pot.

Freeze and finish

  1. Whip the egg whites until frothy and add them to the mixture to make the ice white and soft.

  2. Work the mixture in the freezing pot until well combined.

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

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

  2. Lemon + syruptop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,235 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Syrup + eggtop 32% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,995 recipes

Lemon and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 44,316 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
Provide the main flavour, acidity and zest aroma.
Syrup
Adds sweetness and softens the texture by lowering the freezing point.
Egg whites
Whipped air lightens the texture and makes the ice whiter and softer.

The step that matters

Working the mixture in the freezing pot. Stirring while it freezes breaks up ice crystals, giving a smooth, soft texture instead of a hard, icy one. Stopping too early leaves large crystals.

Swap the lemon

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against syrup, 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.

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