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Lemon Pie with Meringue

A lemon custard pie topped with a sweet meringue.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Lemon Pie with Meringue

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the filling

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Beat 2 eggs and the yolks of 2 more in a bowl.

  3. Add 1 cup of sugar, 2 tablespoons of sweet milk, 1 tablespoon of melted butter, and the grated rind and juice of 1 lemon, then mix the mixture well.

  4. Pour the mixture into a pie crust-lined plate.

  5. Bake the pie until slightly cooled.

Make the meringue and finish

  1. Beat 3 egg whites until stiff.

  2. Gradually add 4 teaspoons of powdered sugar while beating vigorously.

  3. Fold in 3 tablespoons of sugar and ½ teaspoon of lemon extract.

  4. Spread the meringue over the pie.

  5. Bake the pie for about 8 minutes in a 300°F (150°C) oven until golden.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Yolks thicken the lemon filling as they set, giving it a rich, sliceable body.
Sugar
Sweetens the filling and helps stabilise the egg whites in the meringue.
Lemon
Juice and rind provide the sharp acidity and bright aroma of the filling.
Egg whites
Whipped into foam to form the airy structure of the meringue topping.
Butter
Adds fat for a smoother, richer texture in the filling.

The step that matters

Beating the meringue. Egg whites must be beaten until stiff, and sugar added gradually, so the foam holds its shape and does not weep or collapse when baked.

Swap the lemon

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

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

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