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Lobster Chops

A dish of boiled lobster flesh mixed with butter, flour, cream, eggs, spices, breaded and fried into chops.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 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 Chops

Ingredients

Directions

Make the lobster custard

  1. Melt the butter in a stew‑pan until it bubbles.

  2. Sprinkle in the flour and cook briefly.

  3. Pour in the boiling cream and add the lobster dice.

  4. Stir until scalding hot.

  5. Remove from heat and let cool slightly.

  6. Stir in the beaten egg yolks, nutmeg, Cayenne pepper, and salt.

  7. Return the mixture to the heat.

  8. Stir until the eggs are well set.

  9. Butter a platter and spread the lobster mixture to a depth of half an inch.

  10. Let it cool.

Shape and fry

  1. Shape the cooled mixture into chops, pointed at one end.

  2. Coat each chop in bread crumbs.

  3. Dip each chop in the beaten egg.

  4. Coat again in bread crumbs.

  5. Fry the chops in boiling lard until golden brown.

  6. Insert a claw into the end of each chop after cooking.

Arrange and decorate

  1. Arrange the chops in a circle on a napkin, overlapping each other.

  2. Decorate with the lobster tail in the center and the head with long horns on the tail.

  3. Arrange the legs around the outside of the circle.

  4. Cut the legs to form two equal sides of a triangle.

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 + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  3. Nutmeg + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Lobster flesh
Provides the main flavour and the body of the chops.
Egg yolks
Set when heated, binding the lobster mixture into a firm custard.
Butter
Enriches the flavour and adds richness to the custard base.
Flour
Thickens the cream into a stable base for shaping.
Cream
Adds moisture and softness, giving the custard a smooth texture.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden coating when fried.

The step that matters

Stir until the eggs are well set. Egg yolks must be heated enough to set and thicken the custard; if undercooked it stays loose and the chops will not hold their shape, while overheating can make it grainy.

“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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