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Dessert

Orange Gelatine

A chilled gelatin dessert made with orange and lemon juice, egg whites, and Cox's gelatin.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Orange and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Orange Gelatine

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Dissolve the gelatine in hot water.

  2. When cool, add the orange and lemon juice.

  3. Strain the mixture through a fine sieve.

  4. Let it partially harden.

Whip and set

  1. Beat the egg whites until stiff.

  2. Fold the beaten egg whites into the mixture.

  3. Beat the whole mixture for 5 minutes.

  4. Pour into a mold.

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. Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  2. Lemon + eggtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together44,316 recipes

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

  3. Orange + eggtop 31% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together10,696 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

Lemon and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 44,316 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

Gelatine
Sets the liquid into a firm, wobbly structure as it cools.
Egg whites
Whipped into foam, they lighten the mixture and add a airy, fluffy texture.
Orange juice
Provides the main flavour and a bright, sweet-tart acidity.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that sharpens the citrus flavour and balances sweetness.

The step that matters

Fold the beaten egg whites into the mixture. Egg whites must be beaten until stiff, then folded gently so the foam is not deflated. Partly set gelatine helps hold the air in place, so the final texture stays light.

Swap the orange

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

  1. Orangethe original
  2. Limefits about as well
  3. Raspberryfits less well
  4. Blueberryfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against lemon, 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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