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Lemon Meringue Pie

A pie with a lemon custard filling topped with meringue.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 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 ↓

Lemon Meringue Pie

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

  1. In a saucepan, mix the sugar and cornstarch thoroughly.

  2. Pour the boiling water over the mixture and stir constantly over heat until it boils, thickens, and clears.

  3. Add the butter and the beaten egg yolk, stirring for a moment.

  4. Remove from heat and mix in the lemon juice and grated rind.

  5. Allow the filling to cool.

Assemble and finish

  1. Bake a small open pie crust and let it cool.

  2. Pour the cooled filling into the crust.

  3. Cover with meringue and finish as you would for a cornstarch meringue pie.

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 filling as it boils, giving it a sliceable, set body.
Egg yolk
Adds richness and helps enrich the filling's color and body.
Lemon juice
Provides the tart acidity that balances the sugar.
Granulated sugar
Sweetens the filling and balances the lemon's acidity.
Butter
Adds fat for a smoother, richer mouthfeel in the filling.

The step that matters

Boiling the cornstarch mixture. Cornstarch only thickens fully once it reaches a boil, and it must be stirred constantly so it does not scorch or form lumps. Stopping early leaves a runny filling that will not set when cooled.

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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