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Quick Lobster Soup

A creamy lobster soup made with stock, lobster, milk, butter, flour, egg yolks, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Quick Lobster Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the lobster broth

  1. Heat the stock or broth and skim off any fat.

  2. Add the lobster pieces and simmer for 10 minutes.

  3. Bring the mixture to a boil.

Make the thickened milk

  1. In a saucepan, heat the milk.

  2. Stir in the flour and butter mixture.

  3. Pour the thickened milk into the beaten egg yolks.

  4. Cook the mixture for 1 minute.

Combine and serve

  1. Combine the lobster mixture with the thickened milk.

  2. Serve the soup in a tureen.

  3. Serve with oyster crackers and butter.

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + parsleytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,675 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Stock or broth
Forms the liquid base that carries the soup's flavour.
Lobster
Provides the main flavour and the meaty texture of the soup.
Milk
Adds body and a creamy texture to the soup.
Flour
Thickens the milk mixture so the soup becomes smooth and body-rich.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and helps the flour thicken smoothly.
Egg yolks
Enrich and thicken the soup as they set gently with heat.

The step that matters

Pouring the thickened milk into the beaten egg yolks. Adding the hot milk to the yolks gradually, while whisking, warms the yolks without scrambling them. The mixture should then be cooked only briefly, because egg proteins set and can curdle if overheated.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, lobster, milk, butter, flour, egg, pepper):

  1. Nutmegfits about as well
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Tarragonfits about as well
  4. Capersfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, lobster, milk, butter, flour, egg, 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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