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Drink

Orange Water Ice

A chilled beverage made from sugar, lemon, oranges, and water, flavored with orange rind.

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

Why it works: Lemon and orange match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Orange Water Ice

Ingredients

Directions

Make the syrup

  1. Grate the yellow rind of the oranges and rub it into a portion of the sugar to add color and flavor.

  2. Squeeze the juice of the lemon and oranges onto the sugar and mix well.

  3. Add the water and stir until all the sugar is dissolved.

Strain and freeze

  1. Strain the mixture and freeze.

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 + orangetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  2. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + orangetop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,212 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Sugar and lemon 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

Sugar
Provides sweetness and dissolves into the syrup that gives the ice its smooth texture.
Oranges
Supply juice for flavor and zest oils from the rind for aroma and color.
Lemon
Adds acidity that brightens and balances the sweetness of the sugar.

The step that matters

Stir until all the sugar is dissolved. Undissolved sugar crystals stay gritty in the finished ice and can make the freezing uneven, so the syrup should be fully clear before freezing.

“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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