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Lemon Ice

A frozen lemon beverage made with lemon zest, juice, sugar syrup, water, and whipped egg whites.

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

Why it works: Lemon and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 53,532 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Lemon Ice

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the lemonade

  1. Grate the rind of the lemons into a bowl.

  2. Squeeze the juice into the bowl.

  3. Make a boiling syrup with the sugar and 1½ quarts of water.

  4. Pour the hot syrup over the lemon zest and juice.

  5. Let the mixture cool.

  6. Add the remaining 1½ quarts of water to the mixture.

  7. Strain the lemonade into a freezer and freeze as usual.

Add the egg whites and freeze

  1. Whip the egg whites to a firm froth.

  2. Beat the whipped egg whites into the frozen mixture.

  3. Freeze again.

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 + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

Lemon and sugar 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

Lemons
Supply the zest and juice that give the ice its sharp, aromatic flavour.
Sugar
Sweetens the lemon juice and dissolves into the syrup, balancing the acidity.
Egg whites
Whipped to a froth, they add air and a light, fluffy texture to the frozen ice.

The step that matters

Beat the whipped egg whites into the frozen mixture. Egg whites must be whipped to a firm froth so they hold air. If the mixture is too warm or the whites are deflated, the ice turns dense and icy instead of light.

Swap the lemon

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, 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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