Why it works: Lemon and sugar 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 ↓
Lemon Syrup
Ingredients
Directions
Combine lemon juice and loaf sugar in a pot.
Boil while stirring continuously until the mixture is clear.
Add water gradually to prevent the syrup from becoming too thick.
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.
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Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together53,532 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Lemon and sugar 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
- Lemon juice
- Provides acidity and bright lemon flavor that balances the sweetness of the syrup.
- Loaf sugar
- Provides sweetness and body, and thickens the syrup as it dissolves and concentrates.
The step that matters
Add water gradually. Boiling concentrates the sugar as water evaporates, so the syrup thickens quickly. Adding water in portions controls the sugar concentration and keeps the syrup from becoming too thick.
“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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