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Lobster Salad

A salad made with lobster meat, celery, egg yolks, mustard, pepper, salt, vinegar, and sweet oil.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,169 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Lobster Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Chop the meat of the lobsters and celery.

Make the dressing

  1. In a bowl, combine the yolks of the eggs, mustard, pepper, and salt.

  2. Gradually stir in the vinegar.

  3. Slowly add the sweet oil, a few drops at a time, while stirring until the mixture thickens.

Combine

  1. Mix in the chopped lobster and celery until well combined.

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. Celery + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  5. Meat + mustardtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together855 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Emulsify the oil and vinegar, giving the dressing its thick, creamy body.
Sweet oil
Provides fat that, emulsified with the yolks, thickens the dressing and adds richness.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the dressing and balances the richness of the oil.
Lobster meat
Provides the main flesh and sweet flavor of the salad.
Celery
Adds crisp texture and fresh, slightly savory crunch to the salad.
Mustard
Acts as an emulsifying aid that helps keep the oil and yolk mixture stable.

The step that matters

Adding the sweet oil. Oil must be added slowly, a few drops at a time while stirring, so the yolks can emulsify it. Adding it too fast breaks the emulsion, leaving a thin, oily dressing that does not thicken.

Swap the celery

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

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Parsleyfits about as well
  4. Celerythe original

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