Skip to main content
Dessert

Plain Icing

A simple icing made from egg whites, sugar, lemon, and optional corn starch.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Lemon and corn are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,927 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Plain Icing

Ingredients

Directions

Make the meringue

  1. Beat the whites of 4 eggs until very stiff.

  2. Slowly stir in 1 pound of fine sugar and flavor with lemon extract.

  3. If desired, add 1 tablespoon of corn starch to help it dry quickly.

Make the syrup and finish

  1. In a separate pot, boil 1 pound of sugar and 1 pint of water until it forms a thick syrup.

  2. When nearly cold, stir in 2 beaten egg whites and beat until white.

  3. Finally, stir in the juice of 1 lemon and a spoonful of corn starch.

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 + corntop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,927 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

  4. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  5. Sugar + corntop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,168 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

Egg whites
Whipped into a stiff foam that gives the icing its light, airy structure.
Fine sugar
Sweetens the icing and, dissolved into syrup, gives it body and a smooth, thick texture.
Corn starch
Absorbs moisture so the icing dries and sets more quickly.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the sweetness and flavor of the icing.

The step that matters

Adding the egg whites when the syrup is nearly cold. If the syrup is still very hot, it will partly cook the beaten egg whites and cause them to lose their foam. Waiting until it is nearly cold keeps the whites airy so the icing stays light and smooth.

Swap the lemon

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

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

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

You might also like

Lemon CakeLemon Cake228 recipesLemon IceLemon Ice147 recipesLemon SherbetLemon Sherbet103 recipesCorn CakeCorn Cake90 recipes