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Scalloped Lobster

A lobster dish simmered with shells, mace, peppercorns, butter, wine, and lemon juice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and white wine are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,083 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Scalloped Lobster

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the stock

  1. Remove the meat from the lobster in large pieces.

  2. Boil the shells in 1 pint of water with the mace and whole peppercorns.

  3. Strain the liquid after boiling to extract flavors.

Finish and serve

  1. Mix the lobster coral and rich part with melted butter, white wine, and strained lemon juice.

  2. Add the picked lobster to the mixture, boil briefly, and serve.

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. Butter + white winetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,083 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. White wine + lemontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  3. Mace + white winetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,329 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

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

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

  5. Lobster + buttertop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,609 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Lobster
Provides the main meat and the rich coral and tomalley that flavour the sauce.
Melted butter
Adds fat and richness, carrying flavour through the sauce.
White wine
Adds acidity and aroma that brighten the rich lobster mixture.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that balances the richness of the butter and lobster.

The step that matters

Adding the picked lobster and boiling briefly. Lobster meat turns tough and rubbery when overcooked. Adding it at the end and boiling only briefly heats it through while keeping it tender.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lobster, butter, white wine, lemon):

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lobster, butter, white wine, lemon. 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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