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Lobster Pie

A baked pastry dish filled with seasoned lobster meat and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Lobster and anchovy work together. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 470 recipes. Both carry octanal, which smells fat, soap. The science ↓

Lobster Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the filling

  1. Boil the lobsters.

  2. Remove the meat from the tails and claws.

  3. Cut the tail meat into four long pieces.

  4. Beat the claw meat in a mortar.

  5. Season the meat with pepper, salt, vinegar, and anchovy liquor.

  6. Melt the butter and mix it with the meat.

  7. Add the crumbs and egg yolks.

Assemble and bake

  1. Place puff pastry in a dish.

  2. Layer the tail pieces on the pastry.

  3. Pour the meat mixture over the tail pieces.

  4. Cover the filling with pastry.

  5. Bake in a 300°F (150°C) oven until cooked through.

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

    Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).

  2. Anchovy + eggtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,330 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Anchovy + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,697 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + anchovytop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Lobsters
Provide the main meat that forms the body and flavour of the pie.
Fresh butter
Adds richness and moisture to the meat mixture.
Egg yolks
Bind the meat mixture and help it set as it bakes.
Crumbs of 1 small roll
Absorb liquid and give the mixture body so it holds together.
Anchovy liquor
Adds a salty, savoury depth to the lobster meat.

The step that matters

Bake until cooked through. The filling is mostly cooked lobster and egg yolk, so it needs enough heat to set the yolks and fully cook the meat. Underbaking leaves a runny, unsafe centre, while overbaking can make the lobster tough and dry.

“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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