Name: Lobster a LA Newburg
Ingredients: 2 cups cream; 2 eggs; 2 tablespoons butter; 2 cups lobster, broken into fine pieces; 1 tablespoon Ogilvie’s Royal Household flour; ¼ teaspoon mustard; Salt to taste; Red pepper to taste; Worcestershire sauce to taste

Why it works: Lobster and sauce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,095 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Lobster a LA Newburg

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

Heat the cream in a chafing dish.
Once hot, add the butter and flour, stirring until smooth.
Add the lobster and bring to a boil.
Stir in the beaten eggs, then season with salt, red pepper, mustard, and Worcestershire sauce.

Serve

Cook thoroughly and serve over crackers or toast.
Optionally, add 1 cup of green peas.

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.

Lobster + saucetop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,095 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Cream + lobstertop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,050 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,516 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together15,430 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Cream + saucetop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,787 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Cream: Forms the liquid base of the sauce and gives it a rich, smooth body.
Eggs: Thicken the sauce gently as they set with heat, adding richness and body.
Butter: Adds fat for richness and a smooth, silky mouthfeel to the sauce.
Lobster: Supplies the main seafood flavour and tender pieces throughout the dish.
Flour: Thickens the cream into a smooth sauce that coats the lobster.

The step that matters

Stir in the beaten eggs. Egg yolks thicken when heated, but if the sauce gets too hot or boils after the eggs go in, they can curdle and turn grainy. Add them off the boil and stir steadily.

Swap the mustard

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

Spinachfits about as well
Shallotfits about as well
Chivefits about as well
Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, egg, butter, lobster, flour, pepper, sauce. 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.

Lobster Sauce174 recipes

Lobster Croquettes99 recipes

Lobster Balls7 recipes

Tomato Soup526 recipes

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Lobster a LA Newburg