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Lobster Bisque

A creamy soup made from lobster shells, fish bones, stock, herbs, and cream, finished with egg yolks and lemon juice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Lobster and whiting work together. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 73 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Lobster Bisque

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Make the base

  1. Pound the lobster shells and small legs finely in a mortar with the butter.

  2. Add this mixture to a pot with the fish bones, stock, shallot, herbs, and mace.

  3. Simmer for 30 minutes, then strain the mixture.

Finish the bisque

  1. Return the liquid to the pot, add cream, and heat gently.

  2. Whisk in the egg yolks and lemon juice just 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 + whitingtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together73 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Shallot + lemontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,523 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Lobster + creamtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,050 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Whiting + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together135 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Lobster shells
Release concentrated shellfish flavour and colour into the stock during simmering.
Butter
Carries the flavour of the pounded shells and adds richness and fat to the base.
Cream
Adds body, softness and a smooth mouthfeel to the finished bisque.
Egg yolks
Thicken the bisque and add richness when gently heated without boiling.
Stock
Forms the liquid base that extracts and carries the flavours of the shells.

The step that matters

Whisking in the egg yolks. Egg yolks thicken by setting when heated. If the bisque boils or gets too hot after they go in, they can scramble and turn grainy, so add them just before serving and keep the heat gentle.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lobster, butter, whiting, shallot, cream, egg, lemon):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against lobster, butter, whiting, shallot, cream, egg, lemon. 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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