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Lobster Salad

A salad of lobster meat with anchovy, olives, pickles, eggs, lettuce, and a mustard‑egg dressing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Lettuce and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,356 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Lobster Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the lobster

  1. Remove all the flesh from the lobster, taking care of the coral if present.

  2. Cut the meat into bite-sized pieces and place it in a salad dish.

  3. Add anchovy, olives, chopped pickles, quartered hard-boiled eggs, and torn lettuce.

Make the dressing

  1. For the dressing, beat the yolks of two eggs and stir in salt, mustard, and cayenne pepper.

  2. Slowly add olive oil, stirring continuously with a fork until the mixture is stiff and flaky.

  3. Incorporate vinegar and mix well.

Assemble and serve

  1. Pour the dressing over the salad just before serving and top with the coral.

  2. Optionally, add sliced cucumber and onion.

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. Lettuce + mustardtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,356 recipes

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

  2. Lettuce + cucumbertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,409 recipes

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

  3. Cucumber + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,281 recipes

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

  4. Lobster + anchovytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together470 recipes

    Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).

  5. Olive + lettucetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,580 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

What each ingredient does

Lobster flesh
Forms the main body of the salad and provides its sweet, delicate flavour.
Egg yolks
Emulsify the oil and mustard into a thick, stiff dressing.
Olive oil
Adds richness and body to the dressing as it emulsifies with the yolks.
Mixed mustard
Helps stabilise the emulsion so the dressing holds together.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the dressing and balances the rich oil.
Anchovy
Contributes a salty, savoury depth to the dressing and salad.

The step that matters

Slowly adding olive oil to the yolks. Oil must be added gradually while stirring so the yolk emulsifies it. Adding it too fast breaks the emulsion, leaving a thin, oily dressing instead of a thick, stiff one.

Swap the cucumber

The recipe marks cucumber as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lobster, anchovy, olive, egg, lettuce, onion, mustard):

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Spinachfits about as well
  3. Horseradishfits about as well
  4. Cucumberthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lobster, anchovy, olive, egg, lettuce, onion, mustard. 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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