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Lobster Creams

Steamed lobster custard served with a white sauce.

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 Creams

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Pick and pound the meat from the lobster.

  2. In a bowl, combine the lobster meat, egg yolks, melted butter, cream, and seasonings.

  3. Whisk the egg whites until stiff and gently fold them into the mixture.

Steam and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into well-buttered ramekins and steam for 20 minutes.

  2. Turn out the lobster creams and cover with a white sauce mixed with a little lobster spawn.

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

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

  3. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  4. Egg + anchovytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,330 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + anchovytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,697 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Lobster
Provides the main flavour and the delicate meat that forms the body of the creams.
Eggs
Yolks enrich and bind the mixture, while whipped whites lighten it and help it set.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture, giving the creams a smooth, tender texture.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness, keeping the steamed creams soft and smooth.

The step that matters

Folding in the whipped egg whites. Whites must be whipped until stiff and folded in gently. Overmixing deflates the foam, so the creams steam up light and airy.

“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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