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Dessert

Lemon Puffs

A sweet, lightly golden puff made with sugar, lemon juice, lemon rind, eggs, and beaten egg white.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 53,532 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Lemon Puffs

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the mixture

  1. Pass the sugar through a fine sieve and place it in a bowl with the lemon juice; beat well together.

  2. Beat the egg white to a high froth, add it to the bowl, and beat for another 30 minutes.

  3. Add the whole eggs and grated lemon rinds to the mixture and mix well.

Bake and serve

  1. Dust kitchen paper with sugar and drop small amounts of the mixture onto it.

  2. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until puffed and lightly golden.

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

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

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

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

  3. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

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

Sugar
Sweetens the puffs and, when beaten, helps give the mixture body and structure.
Eggs
Whites trap air for lift and structure, while whole eggs add richness and set the puffs as they bake.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity and bright flavour that balances the sweetness of the sugar.
Lemon rind
Contributes aromatic lemon oil and flavour to the puffs.

The step that matters

Beating the egg white to a high froth. Whipped egg white traps air bubbles that expand in the oven and give the puffs their lift. If it is under-whipped the puffs will be dense; over-whipping can make the foam dry and grainy, so the mixture loses its airy structure.

Swap the lemon

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg. 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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