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Lobster Salad

A salad of boiled lobster, hard‑boiled eggs, lettuce, and a dressing of mustard, oil, vinegar, sugar, salt, pepper, cayenne, and egg yolks.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,356 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Lobster Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the dressing

  1. Boil the lobster for about 1 hour, then remove the coral and pound it smooth.

  2. Gradually mix the coral with a dressing made from the yolks of 2 hard-boiled eggs, mustard, salad oil, vinegar, sugar, salt, black pepper, cayenne, and 2 fresh egg yolks.

Assemble the salad

  1. Shred the lettuce, reserving the small curled center for garnish, and fill a salad bowl with it.

  2. Tear or cut the lobster flesh into bits, season with salt and pepper, and mix with a small portion of the dressing.

  3. Pour the remaining dressing over the lobster mixture, place the lettuce hearts down the center, and arrange slices of hard-boiled eggs on the sides.

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. Mustard + lettucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,356 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Pepper + lettucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Lobster
Provides the main meaty flesh of the salad.
Egg yolks
Emulsify the oil and vinegar into a thick, creamy dressing.
Salad oil
Provides fat that gives the dressing a smooth, rich body.
Mustard
Helps stabilize the emulsion and adds a sharp, tangy flavour.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the rich dressing.
Lettuce
Forms the crisp base that holds the lobster and dressing.

The step that matters

Gradually mixing the coral into the dressing. Adding the coral slowly lets the yolks and oil emulsify smoothly, so the dressing does not split or turn greasy.

Swap the lettuce

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

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Capsicumfits about as well
  3. Lettucethe original
  4. Cucumberfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against lobster, egg, mustard, vinegar, sugar, pepper. 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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