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Lobster Cold

A chilled lobster dish with vinegar, mustard, sweet oil, salt, and cayenne pepper dressing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Vinegar and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,067 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Lobster Cold

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Mince the lobster meat very finely.

  2. In a bowl, combine the vinegar, mustard, sweet oil, salt, and cayenne pepper.

  3. Mix the dressing well and pour it over the minced lobster meat.

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. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

  5. Lobster + meattop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together909 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

What each ingredient does

Lobster meat
Forms the main body and flavor of the dish; finely minced so it blends into the dressing.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the flavor and balances the richness of the oil.
Sweet oil
Adds fat for smooth mouthfeel and carries flavor through the dressing.
Mustard
Helps the oil and vinegar emulsify, so the dressing holds together rather than separating.

The step that matters

Mix the dressing well. Oil and vinegar separate quickly if not mixed thoroughly. Mustard helps them emulsify into a smooth dressing, so it coats the lobster evenly instead of pooling as a greasy layer.

Swap the mustard

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

  1. Mustardthe original
  2. Capsicumfits about as well
  3. Lettucefits less well
  4. Shallotfits less well

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

More cold lobster recipes

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