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Dessert

Lemon Pie

A lemon custard pie topped with a sweet meringue.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and corn are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,927 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Lemon Pie

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

  1. Combine egg yolks, sugar, grated lemon rind, lemon juice, and corn starch in a bowl.

  2. Add a little cold water and mix until smooth.

  3. Cook the mixture in 1 cup of boiling water until thickened.

Make the meringue and bake

  1. Beat egg whites in a separate bowl until soft peaks form.

  2. Gradually add 1 tablespoon of sugar to the egg whites until stiff peaks form.

  3. Spread the meringue over the lemon filling.

  4. Bake until lightly browned.

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. Lemon + corntop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,927 recipes

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

  2. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  3. Egg + lemontop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together44,316 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

  4. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  5. Sugar + corntop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,168 recipes

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

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 and enrich the lemon filling, adding richness and a smooth set.
Corn starch
Thickens the lemon filling as it cooks, giving it a sliceable body.
Egg whites
Whipped into a foam that forms the light, airy meringue topping.
Lemon juice
Provides the sharp acidity that balances the sweetness of the filling.
Sugar
Sweetens the filling and helps stabilise the whipped egg white meringue.

The step that matters

Cook the filling until thickened. Corn starch only thickens fully once the mixture has come to a boil and been cooked long enough. Undercooked starch leaves a runny filling that will not hold its shape when sliced.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Coconutfits about as well
  3. Raisinfits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, corn. 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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