Why it works: Lemon and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 53,532 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Lemon Water Ice
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Squeeze the lemons and strain the juice.
Add the lemon juice and clarified sugar to enough cold boiled water to fill a quart ice mold.
Add thin strips of lemon rind to the water while it is boiling to extract flavor, but do not overdo it.
If the mixture is not sweet enough, add more clarified sugar.
Freeze
Freeze the mixture, scraping the sides of the pot regularly to keep it smooth.
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.
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Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together53,532 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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
- Provide the tart acidity and fresh citrus flavor that defines the water ice.
- Clarified sugar
- Adds sweetness and softens the ice, keeping it from freezing rock hard.
- Lemon rind
- Its oils add aroma and a fragrant lemon flavor to the water.
The step that matters
Scraping the sides of the pot while freezing. Water freezing slowly forms large ice crystals, which make the ice coarse and grainy. Regular scraping breaks up forming crystals and keeps the texture smooth.
“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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