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Dessert

Economical Lemon Cheese

A lemon-flavored cheese made by mixing sugar, butter, egg, and lemon juice, then cooking in a water bath.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,227 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Economical Lemon Cheese

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mixture

  1. Rub the sugar onto the lemon rind.

  2. Place the lemon rind in a jar and add the strained juice and butter.

  3. Stir in the beaten egg until well combined.

Cook and store

  1. Set the jar in a pan of boiling water and stir until thickened.

  2. Once cool, cover with paper and store in a cool, dry place.

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. Lemon + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

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

  2. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

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

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

Egg
Thickens the mixture as its proteins set with gentle heat, giving the spread body.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth, silky texture.
Sugar
Sweetens the spread and draws oils from the rind when rubbed into it.
Lemon juice
Provides sharp acidity that balances the sweetness and richness.
Lemon rind
Supplies the aromatic oils that give the spread its strong lemon flavour.

The step that matters

Stir the jar in the pan of boiling water until thickened. The egg proteins set as they heat and thicken the mixture. If the heat is too high or the mixture is not stirred, the egg can scramble into lumps instead of forming a smooth custard-like texture.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Lemonthe original
  3. Raisinfits about as well
  4. Figfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, butter. 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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