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Broiled Lobster

Broiled lobster served with melted butter, oyster crackers, and sliced lemon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Broiled Lobster

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Remove the stomach and long intestine from the lobster, or do it yourself by cutting the back where the shells overlap.

Broil

  1. Lay the lobster, shell side down, on a grill and broil for 30 minutes.

  2. Baste the meat with a mixture of butter and lemon juice four times while cooking.

  3. Halfway through, turn the lobster flesh side down for a few minutes.

Finish and serve

  1. When done, sprinkle with coarse sea salt and cayenne pepper, and split the claws with scissors.

  2. Serve with melted butter, oyster crackers, and sliced lemon.

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. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Butter + oystertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,184 recipes

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

  3. Lobster + oystertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together255 recipes

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

  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
Is the main protein; its meat cooks through and turns opaque under the heat.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture to the meat while it bastes over the heat.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the buttery basting mixture and the rich lobster flavor.

The step that matters

Turning the lobster flesh side down. Turning it halfway exposes the meat directly to heat so it cooks evenly, while the shell protects the base. Turning too late can leave the flesh undercooked or dry.

“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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