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Lobster Cremes

A chilled lobster and egg yolk cream set in aspic jelly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Lobster and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,050 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓

Lobster Cremes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the moulds

  1. Decorate tiny moulds with clear aspic jelly and lobster coral.

  2. Add a layer of hard-boiled egg yolk, passed through a sieve.

Make the lobster mixture

  1. Finely chop the lobster and egg white, then add the fish sauce.

  2. Dissolve the gelatine in the fish sauce and mix it in.

  3. Whip the cream and fold it into the lobster mixture.

Set and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into the decorated moulds and chill until set.

  2. Serve with chopped aspic jelly.

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

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

  2. Cream + peppertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together21,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  3. Egg + fish saucetop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together257 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Egg + creamtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Lobster + peppertop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,247 recipes

    Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).

Cream and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 21,449 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

Gelatine
Sets the mixture so the creams hold their shape when turned out and served.
Cream
Whipped, it adds air and richness, giving the creams a light, smooth texture.
Hen lobster
Provides the main flavour and the coral used for decoration.
Hard-boiled egg
Yolk is sieved for a layer and the white is chopped into the filling, adding body and richness.

The step that matters

Dissolve the gelatine fully in the fish sauce. Undissolved gelatine leaves grainy specks and uneven setting. It must be fully dissolved before folding into the mixture, so the creams set evenly and smoothly when chilled.

“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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