Name: Lobsters in an Italian Salad
Ingredients: 2 lobsters; 2 or 3 cabbage lettuces; 1 beetroot; 1 cucumber; 4 anchovies; fresh tarragon; fresh chervil; 2 boiled eggs

Why it works: Tarragon and chervil match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 824 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Lobsters in an Italian Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Cut the lobsters into pieces by removing the claws and tail, then split each in two.
Rub the lobster spawn through a dry sieve to garnish the salad.
Wash and cut the lettuces into large shreds.
Slice the beetroot and cucumber.
Wash, pick, and cut the anchovies into long shreds.
Chop the tarragon and chervil, and chop the boiled eggs' yolks and whites separately.
If available, boil cauliflowers or French beans and add them to the salad.
Place the lettuce in the center of a dish in a heap.
Arrange the lobster and other ingredients on top according to your taste.
Just before serving, garnish with Italian salad sauce.

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.

Tarragon + cherviltop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together824 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Beetroot + cherviltop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together126 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Beetroot + tarragontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together184 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Beetroot + cucumbertop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together345 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Cucumber + cherviltop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together144 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

Swap the cabbage

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lobster, beetroot, cucumber, tarragon, chervil, egg):

Lettucefits better
Chivefits better
Shallotfits better
Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lobster, beetroot, cucumber, tarragon, chervil, egg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.