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Drink

Vinegar and Lemon Wheys

A drink made by curdling milk with vinegar or lemon juice, then diluting with hot water and sweetening with sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Vinegar and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 20,806 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Vinegar and Lemon Wheys

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Pour vinegar or lemon juice into boiling milk until it becomes clear.

  2. Dilute the mixture with hot water to achieve a pleasant acidity.

  3. Add one or two pieces of sugar to taste.

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. Vinegar + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  2. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

  3. Milk + vinegartop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,949 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Milk
Its proteins coagulate when acid is added, separating into curds and clear whey.
Vinegar or lemon juice
Acid causes the milk proteins to clump, which lets the clear whey separate out.
Hot water
Dilutes the acidity so the whey tastes pleasantly tart rather than sharp.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the remaining sourness of the acidic whey.

The step that matters

Adding the acid to boiling milk. Acid makes milk proteins clump and separate into curds and clear whey. Add it gradually and stop once the liquid runs clear, because too much acid leaves the whey harsh and sour.

“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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