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Dessert

Lemon Tarts

A tart made with lemon juice, sugar, flour, butter, and almonds, baked and topped with currant jelly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,673 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Lemon Tarts

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the filling

  1. Pare the lemons, roll them, and press out the juice.

  2. Cut the lemons with a sharp knife and add the juice, sugar, and flour.

  3. Stir in the butter and chopped almonds last.

  4. Cook the mixture until thick.

Bake and finish

  1. Line tart pans with good crust and fill with the lemon mixture.

  2. Bake until set, then cool and top with currant jelly.

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. Almond + flourtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Lemon + almondtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Almond + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

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

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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
Provide the sharp citrus juice and zest that give the filling its acidity and flavour.
Sugar
Sweetens the filling and, with the juice, helps it thicken into a set custard.
Flour
Thickens the lemon mixture so it holds its shape when cooked and baked.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, tender texture to the filling.
Blanched almonds
Add body and a nutty flavour that contrasts with the tart lemon.

The step that matters

Cook the mixture until thick. Flour thickens only as its starch swells in hot liquid. Undercooking leaves the filling runny, so it will not set properly when baked. Stir constantly to avoid lumps and scorching on the bottom of the pan.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lemon, almond, sugar, flour, 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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