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Lobster Sauce

A sauce made from lobster, butter, anchovies, flour, and water, seasoned with lemon pickle.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Lobster Sauce

Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Lobster Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. In a mortar, combine the lobster pieces, 1 ounce of butter, and the anchovies. Pound together and rub through a fine sieve.

Make the sauce

  1. In a stew pan, add the cut lobster, ¼ pound of butter, and 1 tablespoon of flour. Mix well.

  2. Pour in ½ pint of water and heat over medium heat, stirring until it boils. If too thick, add a little more water.

  3. Stir in the lobster pieces and let it simmer for 1 minute, stirring continuously.

  4. Add lemon pickle to taste before serving.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Flour + lemontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Lobster + buttertop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,609 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

  5. Lobster + flourtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,034 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

Lobster
Provides the main flavour and body of the sauce.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, silky texture to the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the sauce as it heats with the liquid.
Anchovies
Add a deep savoury, salty flavour that enriches the lobster.

The step that matters

Adding the water and bringing to a boil. Flour must be stirred into the fat and liquid while heating so it thickens smoothly without lumps. Starch thickens as it heats and boils, so stirring keeps it even and a little extra water can correct a sauce that sets too thick.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Coconutfits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lobster, butter, flour. 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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