Why it works: Lemon and raspberry are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,109 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓
Sweet Sauce
Ingredients
Directions
Make the sauce
Mix the potato flour with 4 tablespoons of water until smooth.
Stir this mixture into ½ pint of boiling water.
Add sugar or treacle to taste and stir over heat until the sauce boils.
If desired, add 1 ounce of butter and 1 tablespoon of lemon juice.
Vary and finish
For variation, use nutmeg or ground cinnamon instead of lemon juice, or add raspberry jam or fruit syrup for flavor.
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.
-
Lemon + raspberrytop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,109 recipes
Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).
-
Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
-
Potato + lemontop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,230 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
-
Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,456 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
-
Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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
- French potato flour
- Thickens the water into a smooth, glossy sauce as its starch swells when heated.
- Butter
- Adds richness and a silky mouthfeel to the finished sauce.
- Sugar or treacle
- Adds sweetness and a deeper flavor to the sauce.
- Lemon juice
- Adds acidity that brightens the sweetness and balances the flavor.
- Raspberry jam or fruit syrup
- Adds fruity sweetness and aroma as an optional flavoring.
The step that matters
Mix the potato flour into cold water until smooth before adding it to boiling water. Starch clumps into lumps if it hits hot liquid dry or undispersed. Fully suspending it in cold water first lets the granules separate, so they swell evenly and thicken the sauce smoothly when heated.
Swap the raspberry
The recipe marks raspberry as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, flour, sugar, butter, lemon):
- Raisinfits better
- Vanillafits better
- Orangefits better
- Raspberrythe original
Fit is the average pairing score against potato, flour, sugar, butter, lemon. 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.
You might also like
Lemon Cake228 recipes
Raspberry Jam150 recipes
Lemon Ice147 recipes
Deep-Fried Potato Balls119 recipesThe free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.