Why it works: Barley and lemon work together. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 484 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓
Barley Water
Ingredients
Directions
Wash the pearl barley thoroughly in cold water.
Add the washed barley to 2 quarts of boiling water.
Boil until the mixture is reduced to 1 quart, stirring frequently.
Strain the mixture, add lemon juice, and sweeten if desired.
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.
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Barley + lemontop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together484 recipes
Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Pearl barley
- Starch from the grain thickens the water slightly and adds a mild, toasty flavor.
- Lemon juice
- Adds acidity that brightens the flavor and balances any sweetness.
- Sweetener
- Adds sweetness to balance the tartness of the lemon juice.
The step that matters
Boil until reduced to 1 quart, stirring frequently. Reducing the liquid concentrates the flavor and starch from the barley. Stirring frequently keeps the barley from sticking and scorching on the bottom of the pot, which would add a burnt taste.
“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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