Name: Lobster Sauce, Mock
Ingredients: lobster butter; boiled turbot or sole (optional); anchovy paste or essence of shrimps; melted butter

Why it works: Turbot and anchovy match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 110 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-ol, which smells mushroom, earthy. The science ↓

Lobster Sauce, Mock

Ingredients

lobster butter
boiled turbot or sole (optional)
anchovy paste or essence of shrimps
melted butter

Directions

If using, have lobster butter ready.
If not, boil a thick fleshy sole and remove the meat from the bones while warm.
Spread the sole meat with anchovy paste or essence of shrimps.
Cut the meat into small pieces and stir into melted butter.
Heat the sauce through for three to four minutes and serve immediately.

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.

Turbot + anchovytop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together110 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
Lobster + anchovytop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together470 recipes

Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).
Lobster + turbottop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together163 recipes

Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).
Butter + anchovytop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,697 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Lobster + buttertop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,609 recipes

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