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Lemon Syrup

A syrup made from lemon oil, wine spirits, sugar, citric acid, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Spirit and wine work together. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 701 recipes. Both carry isoamyl acetate, which smells banana, fruity. The science ↓

Lemon Syrup

Ingredients

Directions

Dissolve the sugar

  1. Mix the lemon oil and spirits of wine with the sugar.

  2. Heat gently to dissolve the mixture.

Finish and bottle

  1. Allow to cool, then add the citric acid.

  2. Bottle the syrup once it is cold.

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. Spirit + winetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together701 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, fruity).

  2. Lemon + winetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,157 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  4. Spirit + sugartop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together602 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Lemon + spirittop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together256 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

Lemon and sugar 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

White sugar
Provides sweetness and the bulk of the syrup's body.
Lemon oil
Supplies the concentrated lemon aroma and flavor.
Spirits of wine
Dissolves the lemon oil so its flavor disperses evenly through the syrup.
Citric acid
Adds sourness that balances the sweetness and brightens the lemon flavor.

The step that matters

Heat gently to dissolve the mixture. Spirits of wine is volatile and evaporates readily, so strong heat drives off alcohol and can scorch the sugar. Gentle heat dissolves the sugar while keeping the lemon oil's aroma intact.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Applefits better
  3. Orangefits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against spirit, wine, sugar. 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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