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Lobster Chowder

A soup made with lobster, butter, pepper, cream, milk, egg, and toasted crackers.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Lobster and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,050 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓

Lobster Chowder

Ingredients

Directions

Make the chowder

  1. Place the lobster in a saucepan with butter, pepper, cream, and enough milk to cover the meat.

  2. Bring the mixture to a boil.

  3. Quickly stir in a well-beaten egg.

Serve

  1. Serve hot over toasted squares of 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. Lobster + creamtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,050 recipes

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

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Cream + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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 flavor of the chowder.
Butter
Adds richness and a rounded, savory flavor.
Cream
Adds fat for a rich, smooth mouthfeel.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that the lobster cooks in.
Egg
Thickens and enriches the liquid as its proteins set with heat.

The step that matters

Quickly stir in the egg. Egg proteins set when they meet hot liquid, so they can clump and curdle if left in one spot. Stirring quickly while pouring the beaten egg disperses it evenly, so the chowder thickens smoothly.

“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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