Why it works: Milk and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Lemon Pie
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare the filling
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Grate the rind of the lemon.
Cut off the tough skin and chop the pulp.
In a bowl, combine the egg yolks, white sugar, milk, lemon zest, lemon pulp, and cornstarch or flour.
Pour the mixture into a prepared pie crust.
Make the meringue and bake
In another bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form.
Gradually add the 4 teaspoons of white sugar to the egg whites, continuing to beat until glossy.
Spread the meringue over the pie filling.
Bake the pie lightly until the meringue is golden.
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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Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together19,053 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Lemon + flourtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together30,404 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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
- Egg yolks
- Thicken the filling into a rich, set custard as they cook.
- Egg whites
- Whip into a stiff foam that forms the light, airy meringue topping.
- Lemon
- Provides the tart, aromatic flavour from zest and pulp.
- Cornstarch or flour
- Thickens the liquid filling so it holds its shape when sliced.
- White sugar
- Sweetens the filling and stabilises the whipped egg whites into a glossy meringue.
- Milk
- Adds moisture and body to the custard filling.
The step that matters
Baking the meringue. Bake only until the meringue is golden, since overbaking makes the sugar-protein topping weep and toughen, and the filling can curdle or over-set under prolonged heat.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, sugar, milk, flour):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Figfits better
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, milk, flour. 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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