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Dessert

Lemon Ice

A chilled lemon-flavored dessert made by dissolving sugar in water and lemon juice, then churning and freezing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Lemon Ice

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 ↓

Lemon Ice

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. In a large bowl, combine 3 quarts of water, 1 pint of lemon juice, and 2 pounds of sugar.

  2. Stir until the sugar is completely dissolved.

Churn and freeze

  1. Pour the mixture into an ice cream maker and churn according to the manufacturer's instructions.

  2. Once the mixture reaches a slushy consistency, transfer it to a container and freeze until firm.

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.

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.

  1. Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked 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

Sugar
Adds sweetness and lowers the freezing point, keeping the ice cream softer and less icy.
Lemon juice
Provides acidity and the bright, tart lemon flavor that defines the dish.

The step that matters

Stir until the sugar is completely dissolved. Undissolved sugar crystals can remain in the cold base and make the finished ice cream feel grainy. A fully dissolved sugar syrup also freezes more smoothly and evenly.

“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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