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Drink

Orange-water Ice

A frozen beverage made from orange and lemon juice sweetened with syrup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Orange and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Orange-water Ice

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Squeeze the juice from the oranges and lemons through a sieve into a basin.

  2. In a saucepan, heat the syrup with the thin rind of an orange until it reduces to nearly 1½ cups.

  3. Mix the syrup with the orange juice, passing it through the sieve 2-3 times.

Freeze

  1. Pour the mixture into a freezing pot and freeze, stirring well to achieve a smooth texture.

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. Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  2. Lemon + syruptop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,235 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Orange + syruptop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,179 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

China oranges
Provide the main juice, giving the ice its flavour and most of its liquid.
Lemons
Add acidity that brightens the sweetness of the syrup and orange juice.
Syrup
Adds sweetness and, by lowering the freezing point, keeps the ice softer and smoother.

The step that matters

Freeze, stirring well. Stirring during freezing breaks up ice crystals as they form, so the water ice stays smooth rather than forming a coarse, icy texture. Sugar and acid in the mixture also lower the freezing point, so it needs regular stirring to set evenly.

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lemon, syrup):

  1. Orangethe original
  2. Limefits about as well
  3. Raspberryfits less well
  4. Vanillafits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against lemon, syrup. 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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