Skip to main content
Main

Lobster — Continued.

Lobster in shells filled with a béchamel and mushroom mixture, topped with breadcrumbs and butter, baked until browned.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Lobster and sauce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,095 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Lobster — Continued.

6 table-shells
Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the filling

  1. Combine the lobster, mushrooms, and béchamel sauce in a basin.

  2. Boil the mixture until reduced.

  3. Gradually add fish broth and oyster liquor while boiling.

  4. Remove the mixture from heat.

  5. Mix in cayenne pepper.

Fill and bake

  1. Fill the table-shells with the mixture.

  2. Sprinkle the filled shells with bread crumbs.

  3. Drizzle warmed butter over the breadcrumbs.

  4. Bake the shells in a 400°F (200°C) oven until browned.

Serve

  1. Serve the shells on a hot dish.

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 + saucetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,095 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

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

  3. Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  4. Fish + oystertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together496 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  5. Mushroom + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Lobster
Provides the main flesh and sweet, savoury seafood flavour of the filling.
Béchamel sauce
Binds the lobster and mushrooms into a creamy, spoonable filling.
Mushrooms
Add moisture and earthy flavour that complements the lobster.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden topping as the shells bake.
Butter
Adds richness and helps the crumb topping brown.

The step that matters

Boil the mixture until reduced. Reducing the filling drives off excess water and concentrates flavour, so it thickens and does not make the shells soggy or runny when baked.

“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.

You might also like

Brown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesLobster SauceLobster Sauce174 recipesFried FishFried Fish120 recipesLobster CroquettesLobster Croquettes99 recipes