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 Ice
Ingredients
Directions
Make the syrup
Boil sugar and water together for 6 minutes to make a syrup.
Steep and combine
Squeeze the lemon juice and steep it in the lemon rind for 1 hour.
Combine the lemon juice and syrup, then strain the mixture.
Freeze
Cool the mixture and freeze it using 3 parts finely crushed ice to 1 part rock salt.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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.
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Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together53,532 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 ice and, with the syrup, keeps it smoother by limiting large ice crystals.
- Lemon juice
- Provides the sharp acidity and bright lemon flavour that define the dish.
- Rock salt
- Lowers the temperature of the melting ice so the mixture freezes.
- Finely crushed ice
- Chills the mixture, and its fine texture allows it to freeze evenly.
The step that matters
Freezing with ice and rock salt. Salt dissolves into the melting ice and lowers its temperature below the freezing point of water, so the mixture chills enough to freeze. The mixture should be cold before freezing, and the ice should be finely crushed for even chilling.
“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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