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Dessert

Orange and Lemon Ice

A frozen dessert made from orange rind, lemon juice, sugar, water, and beaten egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Orange and lemon 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 and Lemon Ice

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Grate the rinds of the oranges and steep them in slightly more than 1 pint of water for a few moments. Strain the mixture to obtain 1 pint of orange-infused water.

  2. Combine the orange-infused water with 1 pound of sugar and 1 pint of lemon juice.

Freeze and finish

  1. Pour the mixture into a freezer.

  2. When it is half frozen, fold in the beaten egg whites.

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.

  1. Orange + lemontop 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. Lemon + eggtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together44,316 recipes

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

  4. Orange + sugartop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,212 recipes

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

  5. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

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

Oranges
Grated rind adds fragrant citrus aroma and flavor from its oils.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and lowers the freezing point, keeping the ice softer.
Lemon juice
Provides acidity and a bright, sharp flavor that balances the sugar.
Egg whites
Whipped to a stiff froth, they add air and a light, airy texture.

The step that matters

Fold in the egg whites when half frozen. If the mixture is still too liquid, the whites deflate and sink; if it is fully frozen, they cannot be folded in evenly. Half-frozen gives a slushy base that holds the whipped air.

Swap the orange

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

  1. Orangethe original
  2. Vanillafits about as well
  3. Limefits less well
  4. Raisinfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, lemon, 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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