Name: Imperial Drink
Ingredients: juice of 1 lemon; 1 teaspoon cream of tartar; 1 tablespoon honey; 1 pint boiling water

Why it works: Lemon and honey are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,707 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

Imperial Drink

Ingredients

juice of 1 lemon
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 tablespoon honey
1 pint boiling water

Directions

Mix and cool

Combine lemon juice, cream of tartar, and honey in a bowl.
Pour boiling water in and stir until honey dissolves.
Cover mixture and let it cool.

Serve

Serve cold, adding more honey if desired.

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.

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.

Lemon + honeytop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,707 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Cream + honeytop 30% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together738 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).
Lemon + creamtop 30% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together15,640 recipes

Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Lemon and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,640 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

Lemon juice: Provides the sour citrus flavour and aroma that define the drink.
Cream of tartar: Adds acidity that gives a tart, tangy edge.
Honey: Provides sweetness that balances the sourness of the lemon and cream of tartar.