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Dessert

Lemon Pies

A baked lemon custard pie topped with stiffened egg whites and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Lemon Pies

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Prepare a pie crust.

  2. Squeeze juice from the lemons and grate the rind of one lemon.

Make the filling

  1. In a bowl, mix the lemon juice, grated rind, egg yolks, sugar, butter, and cream.

  2. Pour the mixture into the pie crust and bake at 400°F (200°C).

  3. While baking, beat the egg whites until stiff.

Top and finish

  1. Spread the beaten egg whites on top of the pie and sprinkle with sugar.

  2. Return the pie to the oven to brown the topping slightly.

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. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  3. Lemon + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Yolks thicken the lemon filling while whites, beaten stiff, form a meringue topping.
Lemons
Juice and rind supply the sharp acidity and aroma of the filling.
White sugar
Sweetens the filling and helps the meringue topping stay glossy and brown lightly.
Butter
Adds richness and fat for a smoother, softer filling texture.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness, giving the filling a softer, creamier body.

The step that matters

Beating the egg whites until stiff. Whites must be whipped to stiff peaks to hold their shape and form a stable meringue. Under-beaten whites will weep or slump on the pie, and over-beaten whites turn grainy and dry.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Strawberryfits about as well
  3. Raspberryfits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, cream, 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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