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Sea Crayfish

A curry made with sea crayfish, onions, apple, coconut, curry powder, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Sea Crayfish

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the crayfish

  1. Boil the sea crayfish until cooked.

  2. Split the cooked sea crayfish open and remove the uneatable parts.

  3. Pick out all the meat from the body and claws, and the creamy parts from the head.

  4. Cut the flesh into dice.

Make the curry

  1. Melt the butter in a stewpan.

  2. Add the onion and apple to the melted butter.

  3. Cook the onion and apple for 15 minutes without browning.

  4. Add the curry powder and curry paste mixed in a little milk to the vegetables.

  5. Add the crayfish meat to the vegetables.

  6. Soak the grated coconut in the remaining milk for 30 minutes.

  7. Strain the milk after soaking the coconut.

  8. Mix the flour into a smooth paste with the flavored milk.

  9. Stir the flour paste into the curry.

  10. Bring the curry to a boil.

  11. Add salt to taste.

Simmer and serve

  1. Place the curry saucepan in a larger tin with boiling water to simmer gently for 30 minutes.

  2. Serve the curry in a hot dish, garnished with lemon slices and parsley, alongside plain boiled rice.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Milk + coconuttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,648 recipes

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

  3. Apple + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,104 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  4. Crayfish + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together343 recipes

    Shared aroma: anethole (sweet, anise).

  5. Coconut + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,467 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

Onions
Soften and sweeten as they cook, forming the flavour base of the curry.
Flour
Thickens the milk-based liquid into a smooth, body-rich sauce.
Butter
Carries the curry spices and adds richness to the sauce.
Milk
Forms the liquid of the sauce, adding creaminess and moisture.
Grated coconut
Infused into the milk to add sweetness and coconut flavour.
Sea crayfish
Provides the main protein, with tender flesh that absorbs the sauce.

The step that matters

Cook the onion and apple without browning. Browning turns the sugars bitter and darkens the flavour, while gentle sweating softens the vegetables and builds a mild, sweet base for the curry.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (crayfish, onion, milk, coconut, flour, butter):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Avocadofits better
  3. Peachfits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against crayfish, onion, milk, coconut, flour, butter. 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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