Why it works: Lemon and white wine are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,832 recipes. Both carry myrcene, which smells balsamic, herbaceous. The science ↓
Lemon Sauce
Ingredients
Directions
Make the sauce
Boil the juice and grated peel of the lemons with sugar and white wine or water until it becomes syrupy.
Remove from heat and stir in the beaten egg yolks and half of the beaten egg whites.
Transfer to a sauceboat and sweeten with pulverized sugar.
Decorate and serve
Use the remaining beaten egg whites to decorate the sauce.
Serve immediately.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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 + white winetop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,832 recipes
Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).
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Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together53,532 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Lemon + eggtop 19% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together44,316 recipes
Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).
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Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Sugar + white winetop 30% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,586 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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
- Lemons
- Provide the sharp acidity and fragrant aroma that define the sauce.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the sauce and thickens it as it cooks down to a syrup.
- Eggs
- Egg yolks thicken the sauce and add richness; whites add a light, frothy texture.
The step that matters
Stirring in the beaten egg yolks off the heat. Egg yolks thicken by setting when heated. Adding them to a boiling mixture can scramble them, so they are stirred in after removing the pan from the heat, which keeps the sauce smooth.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, white wine, egg):
- Vanillafits about as well
- Lemonthe original
- Applefits less well
- Plumfits less well
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, white wine, egg. 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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