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Buttered Lobster

A lobster dish cooked in butter, lemon, mustard, cayenne, and cracker crumbs, baked in shells or pans.

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 ↓

Buttered Lobster

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. If using canned lobster, open it and empty it into a bowl an hour before using.

  2. Mince the lobster evenly.

Make the lobster mixture

  1. In a saucepan, combine lemon juice, butter, and seasoning.

  2. Heat until it simmers.

  3. Add the lobster and half of the cracker crumbs to the saucepan.

  4. Cook slowly, covered, for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Bake and serve

  1. Fill paté pans or scallop shells with the lobster mixture.

  2. Place a small piece of butter on each and cover with remaining cracker crumbs.

  3. Bake until light brown.

  4. Serve hot in the shells with sliced lemon and crackers.

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

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

  3. Lemon + mustardtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,816 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

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 body of the dish.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture, and helps the top brown in the oven.
Cracker crumbs
Absorb liquid and thicken the mixture, giving it a bound, spoonable texture.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rich butter and lobster flavor.

The step that matters

Cook slowly, covered, for 10 minutes. Gentle covered cooking heats the lobster through without toughening its proteins, which tighten and turn rubbery under high heat. Occasional stirring keeps the crumbs from scorching on the bottom of the pan.

Swap the mustard

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, butter, lemon, 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.

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