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Lobster a LA Braise

A lobster stuffed with butter, eggs, bread, and seasonings, baked for 15 minutes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Lobster a LA Braise

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the filling

  1. Pound the meat of the lobster very fine with the butter.

  2. Season with nutmeg, salt, and white pepper.

  3. Add a little grated bread and beat up the eggs.

  4. Reserve part of the eggs to put over the meat.

Shape and bake

  1. Shape the mixture into the form of a lobster.

  2. Pound the spawn and red part, and spread it over the shaped lobster.

  3. Bake for 15 minutes.

Serve

  1. Just before serving, lay the tail and body shell over it, with the small claws underneath to resemble a lobster.

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Nutmeg + white peppertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,375 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  4. Nutmeg + breadtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,997 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Butter + nutmegtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together24,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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 dish and provides the flavorful, tender meat for the filling.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture, keeping the pounded lobster mixture soft and smooth.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and set when baked, holding the shaped lobster together.
Grated bread
Absorbs moisture and adds body, helping the mixture hold its shape.

The step that matters

Shape the mixture into the form of a lobster. The filling must be firm enough to hold its shape while baking. Packing it evenly and firmly helps it keep its form and cook through without cracking or spreading.

Swap the white pepper

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lobster, butter, nutmeg, bread, egg. 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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