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Dessert

Lemon Filling for Two Pies

A sweet lemon custard made with sugar, butter, lemon, eggs, and cornstarch.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and lemon 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 Filling for Two Pies

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

  1. Mix sugar, salt, and cornstarch together in a bowl.

  2. Add butter and mix until combined.

  3. Grate lemon rind and squeeze in lemon juice.

  4. Stir in egg yolks until smooth.

  5. Gradually add boiling water.

  6. Cook in a double boiler until thickened.

Top and bake

  1. Pour filling into baked pie shells.

  2. Beat egg whites until stiff. Add powdered sugar and fold into lemon filling.

  3. Place pies in the oven to brown.

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. Butter + lemontop 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. Egg + lemontop 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

Egg yolks
Thicken the filling and add richness and a smooth custard texture.
Cornstarch
Thickens the filling as it cooks with the boiling water.
Egg whites
Whipped into a stiff foam that forms a light topping that browns in the oven.
Lemon juice
Adds the sharp acidity that gives the filling its tart flavor.
Sugar
Sweetens the filling and balances the acidity of the lemon.

The step that matters

Cook in a double boiler until thickened. Cornstarch needs to reach a full boil to reach its maximum thickening power, while egg yolks can scramble if overheated. Gentle, steady heat in a double boiler lets the filling thicken smoothly without lumps or curdling.

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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