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Lemon Paste for Tarts or Patties

A thick lemon paste made with sugar, lemon juice, rind, eggs, and butter, used in tart crusts.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,227 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Lemon Paste for Tarts or Patties

Ingredients

Directions

Make the lemon paste

  1. In a saucepan, combine sugar, lemon juice, lemon rind, eggs, and butter.

  2. Stir gently over low heat until thickened, resembling honey; do not let it boil.

  3. Pour into bottles or jars and store in a cool place.

Use

  1. To use, bake tart crusts, add a little lemon paste while crusts are hot, and return to the oven until melted.

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Lemon + eggtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together44,316 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

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

Granulated sugar
Adds sweetness and body, thickening the paste as it sets.
Lemon juice
Provides the sharp acidity that gives the paste its flavor.
Eggs
Thicken the mixture as they cook gently, giving the paste a smooth, set texture.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth, silky mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Stirring over low heat without boiling. Eggs thicken when heated gently but can scramble or curdle if they get too hot. Keeping the heat low and avoiding a boil lets the mixture thicken smoothly into a honey-like paste.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Lemonthe original
  3. Raisinfits about as well
  4. Figfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, 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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