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Artificial Lemon-juice

A simple artificial lemon juice made by dissolving sugar in vinegar and optionally adding flavoring and lemon peel.

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 ↓

Artificial Lemon-juice

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Combine 3 ounces of Crystal Vinegar and 1 teaspoon of pounded Lump Sugar in a bowl.

  2. Add 6 drops of flavoring if desired.

  3. For added lemon flavor, infuse some Lemon peel in the mixture.

  4. Stir well until the sugar is dissolved.

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. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  3. Vinegar + lemontop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,334 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

Crystal vinegar
Provides the sharp, sour acidity that stands in for lemon juice's tartness.
Lump sugar
Sweetness that softens the sharpness of the vinegar, balancing the sour taste.

The step that matters

Stir until the sugar is dissolved. Undissolved sugar stays gritty and makes the sweetness uneven. Thorough stirring dissolves the crystals fully into the vinegar so the liquid tastes smooth and evenly balanced.

Swap the lemon

The recipe marks lemon as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (vinegar, sugar):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Strawberryfits better
  3. Pineapplefits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, sugar. 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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