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Dessert

Lemon Pie

A lemon custard filling baked in a pie crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,227 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Lemon Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the filling

  1. Beat the yolks of 3 eggs.

  2. Gradually stir in 1 cup of sugar.

  3. Add a small lump of butter, a pinch of salt, the juice of 1 lemon and a little grated lemon rind.

  4. Dissolve 1 tablespoon of starch in a little cold water and add it to the mixture.

  5. Transfer the mixture to a double boiler and stir steadily.

  6. Pour in 1¼ cups of hot water and boil for about 5 minutes.

Assemble and bake

  1. Pour the filling into a baked pie crust.

  2. Make frosting from the whites of 3 eggs.

  3. Bake the pie in a moderate oven (350°F / 175°C).

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. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

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

  2. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

  5. Egg + lemontop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together44,316 recipes

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

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

Egg yolks
Thicken the filling and add richness and a custard-like body.
Sugar
Sweetens the filling and balances the sharpness of the lemon.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity and bright lemon flavour to the filling.
Starch
Thickens the liquid filling so it sets firm when cooled.
Butter
Adds fat for a smoother, richer texture in the filling.

The step that matters

Boil the filling after adding the starch. Starch only thickens fully once it reaches a boil, and the yolks must be kept from scrambling. Stirring steadily while it heats keeps the filling smooth and evenly thickened.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Lemonthe original
  3. Raisinfits about as well
  4. Figfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, butter. 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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