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Scalloped Lobsters

A lobster dish where the meat is mixed with sauce, seasoned, stuffed into shells, topped with breadcrumbs and butter, and baked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Lobster and sauce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,095 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Scalloped Lobsters

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the filling

  1. Remove the meat from the lobster and pound it in a mortar.

  2. Mix the pounded lobster with the white sauce or melted butter and the seasoning.

Fill and bake

  1. Split the empty shells of the lobster bodies and tails.

  2. Fill each shell with the lobster mixture.

  3. Sprinkle a few bread crumbs and a piece of butter on top.

  4. Brown in a 400°F (200°C) oven.

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. Lobster + saucetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,095 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Bread + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

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

  3. Lobster + breadtop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together736 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  4. Sauce + breadtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,934 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Sauce + peppertop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,303 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Sauce and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,303 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

Lobster
Provides the main protein and flesh that makes up the filling.
White sauce or melted butter
Adds moisture and richness so the pounded lobster stays tender rather than dry.
Bread crumbs
Forms a crisp, golden topping when browned in the oven.

The step that matters

Browning in the oven. The crumbs and butter on top need enough oven heat to brown without drying out the filling beneath. Browning comes from the Maillard reaction, which needs dry surface heat, so the topping should be watched closely.

“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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