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 ↓
Bessie Fraser, Goderich, Lake Huron
Ingredients
Directions
Cook the sugar and fruit
Boil 1 lb sugar in ½ pint water until clear.
Add 1 pint sliced apples.
Soak 1 oz gelatine, then add with rind and juice of 2 lemons.
Whisk and set
Beat until cold and slightly stiffened.
Add beaten whites of 2 eggs.
Put mixture in mould to set.
Serve
Serve with custard made with yolks of eggs, or else use whipped cream.
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. See the original page.
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 + eggtop 19% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together44,316 recipes
Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).
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
- Gelatine (in the method)
- Provides the setting structure that holds the mixture together as it cools.
- Eggs
- Beaten whites trap air, lightening the texture of the set mixture.
- Lemons
- Juice adds sharp acidity and the rind adds aromatic citrus oils.
- Sugar (in the method)
- Sweetens the mixture and balances the acidity of the lemon.
- Apples (in the method)
- Add fruit flavour and soft pieces suspended in the set gelatine.
The step that matters
Beat until cold and slightly stiffened. Gelatine sets as it cools, so the mixture must be thickened but still fluid. If it sets too far, the beaten egg whites cannot be folded in evenly and the texture becomes lumpy.
“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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