Name: Gratin of Lobster
Ingredients: 1 good-sized lobster; 2 teaspoons chopped shallots; 2 tablespoons butter; 1 tablespoon flour; ½ cup milk; cayenne pepper to taste; coarse sea salt to taste; chopped parsley to taste

Why it works: Shallot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,737 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Gratin of Lobster

Ingredients

Directions

Cut the lobster in half and detach the head from the body.
Remove all the meat and save the four shells.
Cut the lobster meat into slices.
In a saucepan, heat the shallots and butter over medium heat for a few minutes.
Add the flour and mix well.
Stir in the milk and cook for about five minutes until boiling.
Add the lobster meat and season with cayenne, salt, and chopped parsley.

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.

Shallot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together3,737 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together34,122 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Shallot + flourtop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,081 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Shallot + peppertop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,898 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

Swap the shallot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lobster, butter, flour, milk, pepper, parsley):

Potatofits about as well
Shallotthe original
Carrotfits about as well
Capsicumfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against lobster, butter, flour, milk, pepper, parsley. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.