Why it works: Lemon and sugar 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 ↓
Another Excellent Drink
Ingredients
Directions
Juice the lemons and add the thinly pared rind.
Add the loaf sugar and pour the boiling water over the mixture.
Let it stand for an hour or more.
Strain the mixture and let it cool thoroughly before using.
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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Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together53,532 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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
- Lemon juice
- Provides the sour, acidic flavour that balances the sweetness of the sugar.
- Loaf sugar
- Sweetens the drink and balances the acidity of the lemon juice.
- Lemon rind
- Adds aromatic oils from the peel, giving a fragrant lemon flavour.
The step that matters
Let it stand for an hour or more. Steeping lets the sugar dissolve fully and draws flavour and aromatic oils from the lemon rind into the liquid, so the drink tastes rounded rather than thin or sharp.
“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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