Skip to main content
Dessert

Ice Water Meringue

A light meringue made with egg whites, sugar, salt, lemon juice, and ice water, baked until crisp.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Sugar and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 53,532 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Ice Water Meringue

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Ensure egg whites are very cold.

Whip the meringue

  1. Add salt and half of the ice water, then beat until white and fluffy.

  2. Add lemon juice and remaining ice water, and beat for one more minute.

  3. Gradually add sugar and continue beating until the mixture is very stiff.

Bake

  1. Spread on any pie and bake in a moderate oven (350°F / 175°C) for about 12 minutes.

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

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

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

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

  3. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 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 foam, they provide the structure that holds the meringue together.
Fine granulated sugar
Stabilizes the foam and adds sweetness, giving the meringue a glossy, stiff texture.
Lemon juice
Acidity helps stabilize the whipped egg white foam and adds a slight tang.
Ice water
Adds moisture and helps the meringue whip to a lighter, more stable volume.

The step that matters

Gradually add sugar and beat until very stiff. Adding sugar slowly lets it dissolve into the foam, producing a stable, glossy meringue. Added too fast or too early, the sugar can weigh down the foam and prevent full volume.

Swap the lemon

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar. 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 recipesLemon CustardLemon Custard64 recipes