Name: Lemon Pie Made with Milk
Ingredients: 1 cup milk; 1 cup sugar; 2 egg yolks; 1 large lemon; 2 tablespoons flour; a pinch of salt; butter (size of an egg); 2 egg whites; 2 tablespoons powdered sugar

Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Lemon Pie Made with Milk

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

Heat the milk in a double boiler.
In a bowl, beat the egg yolks, then add sugar, salt, flour, lemon juice, and a little grated lemon rind.
Combine this mixture with the heated milk.
When thickened, pour into a pie crust.

Top and finish

Make meringue by beating the egg whites until stiff, then gradually add powdered sugar.
Spread the meringue over the pie.

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.

Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together92,116 recipes

Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together19,053 recipes

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

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Egg yolks: Thicken the custard and add richness as they set with the heated milk.
Egg whites: Whip into a stiff foam that forms the light, sweet meringue topping.
Flour: Stabilises the custard so it thickens without becoming grainy or runny.
Sugar: Sweetens the custard and helps balance the sharpness of the lemon.
Lemon: Adds acidity and aroma from the juice and grated rind.

The step that matters

Pour the custard only when it has thickened. Egg yolks and flour thicken the custard as it heats. Pouring it too early yields a thin filling that may not set firmly in the crust.

Swap the lemon

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

Vanillafits better
Raisinfits better
Figfits better
Lemonthe original

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

Lemon Cake228 recipes

Lemon Ice147 recipes

Lemon Sherbet103 recipes

Lemon Custard64 recipes

Like knowing why a recipe works?

The free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.

Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.

Lemon Pie Made with Milk