Name: Pineapple Water
Ingredients: 1 moderate-sized pineapple; juice of 1 large fresh lemon; 1 pound sugar; 1 pint water; 2 pints cold spring water

Why it works: Pineapple and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,964 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Pineapple Water

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pineapple

Pare and slice the pineapple, then pound it in a mortar to a pulp.
In a bowl, combine the pineapple pulp with the strained lemon juice.

Make the syrup

Make a syrup by boiling 1 pound of sugar in 1 pint of water.
Pour the boiling syrup over the pineapple mixture and cover the jug.

Steep and serve

Let it sit in a cool place for at least 2 hours.
Strain the mixture through a napkin and add 2 pints of cold spring water.
Serve chilled.

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.

Pineapple + lemontop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,964 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together53,532 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Pineapple + sugartop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together4,841 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

Pineapple: Provides the main fruit flavour and most of the drink's body once pounded to a pulp.
Lemon juice: Adds acidity that brightens the sweetness and balances the drink.
Sugar: Sweetens the drink and dissolves into the boiling water to form a syrup.