Name: Flaxseed Lemonade
Ingredients: 2 tablespoons whole flaxseed; 1 pint boiling water; juice of 2 lemons; 2 tablespoons honey

Why it works: Flaxseed and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 151 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Flaxseed Lemonade

Ingredients

2 tablespoons whole flaxseed
1 pint boiling water
juice of 2 lemons
2 tablespoons honey

Directions

Make the flaxseed base

Combine flaxseed and boiling water in a bowl.
Let it stand until cool, then strain the mixture.

Finish and serve

Add the lemon juice and honey to the strained liquid.
Stir well and serve.

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.

Flaxseed + lemontop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together151 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Flaxseed + honeytop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together124 recipes

Shared aroma: hexan-1-ol (green, grassy).
Lemon + honeytop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,707 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Whole flaxseed: Releases soluble fiber into hot water, giving the drink a light, slightly thick body.
Lemon juice: Adds acidity that brightens the flavor and balances the sweetness.
Honey: Adds sweetness and rounds out the tartness of the lemon.