Why it works: Sugar and lemon 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 Syrup
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the syrup
Dissolve the citric acid in warm water.
Mix the dissolved acid with the sugar and water.
Do not use a brass kettle.
Cool and bottle
Allow the mixture to cool completely.
Add the lemon oil and bottle the syrup.
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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Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together53,532 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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
- Citric acid
- Provides the sour, tart edge that balances the sweetness.
- Loaf sugar
- Sweetens the syrup and gives it body.
- Lemon oil
- Adds concentrated lemon aroma and flavour.
The step that matters
Do not use a brass kettle. Citric acid is acidic and can react with brass, which can leach metal into the syrup and alter its flavour and colour. Use a non-reactive vessel instead.
“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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