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Lobster-Sauce, or Crab-Sauce, for Turbot, Etc.

A sauce made from lobster, butter, cayenne pepper, and optional cream, seasoned with salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 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-Sauce, or Crab-Sauce, for Turbot, Etc.

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the lobster

  1. Boil the lobster until cooked.

  2. Pound the spawn and coral with butter or a little oil.

Make the sauce

  1. Sieve the mixture into melted butter and mix until smooth.

  2. Season with cayenne and salt.

  3. Cut the lobster meat into small dice and add to the sauce.

  4. Heat the sauce gently, but do not boil.

  5. Optionally, add cream that has been boiled 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.

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

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

  3. Butter + caviartop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together107 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

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

  5. Lobster + caviartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together29 recipes

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

What each ingredient does

Lobster spawn and coral
Gives the sauce its rich lobster flavour and a deep orange colour.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, silky texture to the sauce.
Lobster meat
Provides the chunks of lobster that give the sauce body and bite.
Cream
Adds extra richness and softens the sauce's flavour when used.

The step that matters

Heat the sauce gently, but do not boil. Butter and egg-free emulsified sauces can separate or turn greasy when overheated. Gentle heat keeps the butter fat suspended and the sauce smooth, while keeping the lobster meat tender rather than rubbery.

“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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