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Dessert

Lemon Sauce

A sweet and tart sauce made with sugar, butter, egg, lemon juice and rind, thickened with cornstarch and boiling water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Lemon Sauce

Why it works: Butter and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,227 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Lemon Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. In a bowl, combine the sugar, butter, beaten egg, lemon juice, and grated rind.

  2. In a separate bowl, mix cornstarch with a little cold water to dissolve.

  3. Add the cornstarch mixture to the lemon mixture.

  4. Pour in the boiling water and stir well.

  5. Cook over low heat, stirring constantly, until thickened.

Serve

  1. Serve hot or cold over pudding.

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.

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.

  1. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

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

  2. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

  5. Egg + lemontop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together44,316 recipes

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

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

Cornstarch
Thickens the sauce as it heats, giving it body.
Egg
Adds richness and helps bind the sauce as it cooks.
Butter
Adds fat for a smooth, rich mouthfeel.
Lemon
Provides the sharp acidity and aroma that flavor the sauce.
Granulated sugar
Sweetens the sauce and balances the lemon's acidity.

The step that matters

Cook over low heat, stirring constantly. Cornstarch thickens only when heated enough to swell its starch granules, and it can scorch or form lumps if left unstirred over heat. Gentle, constant stirring keeps the sauce smooth and evenly thickened.

Swap the lemon

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, 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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