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Dessert

Lemon Cheese-Cakes

A baked lemon-flavored cheese cake made with butter, sugar, eggs, lemon rind, lemon juice, brandy, and puff pastry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and brandy are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,127 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Lemon Cheese-Cakes

Oven, in the book's wordsA brisk oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a brisk oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Melt the butter in a bowl.

  2. Add the fine sugar, egg yolks, and egg white; beat well.

  3. Mix in the grated lemon rind, lemon juice, and brandy.

Fill and bake

  1. Line patty pans with puff pastry.

  2. Fill the pastry with the mixture.

  3. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven until set, being careful not to burn.

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. Butter + brandytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,127 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

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

  3. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Egg + brandytop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,340 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetoin (butter, cream).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Butter
Adds richness and fat that gives the filling a smooth, tender texture.
Egg yolks
Thicken the filling as they set, giving it a custard-like structure.
Egg white
Adds protein that helps the filling set and hold its shape when baked.
Fine sugar
Sweetens the filling and helps it brown lightly as it bakes.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour and helps the eggs set.

The step that matters

Bake until set, without burning. Egg-based fillings set as proteins coagulate with heat; too much heat or time overcooks them, making them grainy and causing the sugar and pastry to scorch.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Apricotfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

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