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To Boil Lobsters

A method for boiling lobsters and serving them with butter and optional garnishes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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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 ↓

To Boil Lobsters

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Choose lobsters and tie their claws together with twine.

  2. Bring water and salt to a fast boil.

Cook

  1. Add lobsters to the boiling water; cook a moderate sized lobster for 20-30 minutes, or a large one for 45 minutes or more.

  2. Remove lobsters and wipe them with a damp cloth.

  3. Rub cold butter over the lobsters and wipe again.

Cut and serve

  1. Remove the large claws and crack the shells at the joints.

  2. Separate the tail from the body and split it down the middle.

  3. Arrange the lobster on a serving dish, garnished with curled parsley if desired.

  4. Serve with remoulade or your preferred sauce, or oil and chili vinegar.

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. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  4. Parsley + vinegartop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,477 recipes

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

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

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

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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 dish, with its meat cooked through by boiling.
Cold butter
Adds richness and a silky mouthfeel to the warm lobster meat.
Coarse sea salt
Seasons the boiling water so the lobster meat is lightly flavoured as it cooks.

The step that matters

Timing the boil. Cooking too long toughens lobster meat, because the proteins tighten and squeeze out moisture. Size determines time, so check the lobster size before setting a timer.

Swap the parsley

The recipe marks parsley as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lobster, butter, sauce, vinegar):

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Parsleythe original
  4. Garlicfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against lobster, butter, sauce, vinegar. 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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