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Lobster

A lobster paste made by boiling, beating, seasoning, and coating with melted butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Mace and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,557 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Lobster

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the lobster

  1. Boil the live lobster in salted water, inserting a skewer in the vent to prevent water from entering.

  2. Once cooled, remove all the flesh from the lobster and finely beat it in a mortar.

Season and pack

  1. Season the lobster flesh with beaten mace, grated nutmeg, pepper, and salt.

  2. Melt 2 tablespoons of butter and mix it with the lobster paste.

  3. Press the mixture into a pot as tightly as possible.

Seal with butter

  1. Melt additional butter in a deep pan, skimming off any scum.

  2. Pour the clear melted butter over the lobster mixture until well covered.

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. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Nutmeg + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  3. Mace + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,257 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  4. Nutmeg + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together24,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

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

Mace and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,257 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Lobster
Forms the main body of the paste, providing its flavour and firm, rich texture.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, helping the paste hold together and feel smooth.
Mace
Adds a warm, aromatic spice flavour that complements the seafood.
Nutmeg
Contributes a warm, sweet aroma that rounds out the seasoning.

The step that matters

Press the mixture into the pot as tightly as possible. Packing removes air pockets, so the paste sets dense and holds together, and the clarified butter seal then keeps air and spoilage out.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lobster, nutmeg, pepper, butter):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against lobster, nutmeg, pepper, 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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