Why it works: Milk and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,053 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Lemon Pie
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Make the filling
Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).
In a bowl, mix the egg yolks, sugar, salt, milk, cornstarch, lemon juice, and lemon zest until smooth.
Pour the mixture into a pie crust and bake slowly until set.
Make the meringue and finish
In another bowl, beat the egg whites until soft peaks form, then gradually add the powdered sugar until stiff peaks form.
Spread the meringue over the pie and bake until lightly browned.
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.
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Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together19,053 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together53,532 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Egg + milktop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Egg + lemontop 19% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together44,316 recipes
Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).
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 the filling and add richness and colour to the custard.
- Egg whites
- Whip into a foam that forms the light, stable meringue topping.
- Cornstarch
- Thickens the lemon filling so it sets and holds its shape when sliced.
- Lemon juice
- Adds the sharp acidity that balances the sweetness of the filling.
- White sugar
- Sweetens the filling and helps stabilise the custard texture.
- Powdered sugar
- Dissolves easily into the whipped whites to sweeten and stabilise the meringue.
The step that matters
Beat the egg whites to stiff peaks. Egg whites must be whipped until stiff and gradually sweetened so the foam holds air and does not weep or collapse. Any fat or yolk left in the whites prevents full whipping.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, sugar, milk):
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits about as well
- Raisinfits about as well
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, milk. 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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