Why it works: Sugar and lemon 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 ↓
Lemonade.— Limonade. Grannie’s Recipe.
Ingredients
Directions
Mix the cold water and sugar together.
Pare the lemon rinds very thin and steep them in the water for 4 hours.
Add the freshly squeezed and strained lemon juice.
Strain all through a jelly bag and use immediately.
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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Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together53,532 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
- Lump sugar
- Dissolves into the water to provide sweetness that balances the lemon's acidity.
- Lemon juice
- Supplies the sharp acidity and bright lemon flavour that define the drink.
- Lemon rinds
- Steeping in the water releases aromatic oils from the peel, adding fragrance and flavour.
The step that matters
Paring the lemon rinds very thin. Thick pith carries bitter compounds into the water during the 4-hour steep, so thin paring keeps the lemonade flavour clean and aromatic rather than bitter.
“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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