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Dessert

Filling for Lemon Pie

A lemon custard filling topped with meringue.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and butter 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 ↓

Filling for Lemon Pie

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

  1. In a saucepan, combine boiling water and cornstarch, stirring until thickened.

  2. Add powdered sugar, egg yolks, lemon juice, salt, and butter; mix well.

  3. Pour the mixture into a pie crust and bake until set.

Top and brown

  1. Beat the egg whites until stiff.

  2. Add sugar to the egg whites and spread over the baked pie.

  3. Brown the meringue lightly in the oven.

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. Lemon + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

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

  2. Egg + buttertop 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 boiling water into a smooth, sliceable filling as it gelatinises.
Egg yolks
Enrich and help set the filling, adding richness and body.
Lemon juice
Provides the sharp acidity that defines the pie's flavour.
Egg whites
Whip into a foam that forms the airy, sweet meringue topping.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smoother, silkier filling texture.

The step that matters

Baking the meringue until lightly browned. Meringue needs enough heat to brown and firm the surface, but overbaking makes it weep and turn tough. Watch it closely and stop once the peaks are golden.

Swap the lemon

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, 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.

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