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A Lobster Pie

A baked pastry dish containing lobster, oysters, shrimps, and a forcemeat mixture.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

A Lobster Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Season the lobster meat with pepper, salt, and mace.

  2. Line a dish with puff pastry.

Assemble

  1. Add the lobster, oysters, picked shrimps, bread crumbs, and butter to the dish.

  2. Make a forcemeat by mixing oysters, suet, anchovies, bread crumbs, pepper, salt, and egg yolks.

  3. Form the forcemeat into balls.

  4. Add the forcemeat balls to the dish with oyster liquor and gravy.

  5. Cover with pastry.

Bake

  1. Bake in the oven at 350°F (175°C) for less than 30 minutes.

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Lobster + shrimptop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together403 recipes

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

  3. Meat + shrimptop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together584 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  4. Oyster + shrimptop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together531 recipes

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

  5. Shrimp + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,931 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Lobster meat
Provides the main filling and rich, sweet seafood flavour.
Egg yolks
Bind the forcemeat so the balls hold their shape during baking.
Bread crumbs
Soak up liquid and give the forcemeat a soft, binding body.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture to the filling.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the forcemeat moist and tender.
Puff pastry
Forms a crisp, flaky top and base that browns in the oven.

The step that matters

Forming and covering the forcemeat balls. Forcemeat balls must be firm and fully enclosed by pastry so they cook through and keep their shape, while the pastry bakes crisp rather than soggy from the liquid.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, lobster, pepper, oyster, shrimp, bread, butter):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Garlicfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, lobster, pepper, oyster, shrimp, bread, 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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