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Lobster Soup

A savory soup made with onions, butter, ham, beef, stock, haddock, lobster, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and beef are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Lobster Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Chop the onions and place them in a stew-pan with butter, ham, and beef.

  2. Cook until the onions are soft, then gradually mix in the rich stock and bring to a boil.

  3. Strain the mixture through a fine sieve, pressing the onion pulp with a wooden spoon.

Add the fish and finish

  1. Add the haddock meat and lobster to a mortar and beat until smooth, then stir in the soup.

  2. Bring the soup to a boil again, skimming off any foam.

  3. Cut the lobster tail and claws into pieces and add them to the soup before serving.

  4. Season with pepper, cayenne, white pepper, and white wine.

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. Onion + beeftop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Haddock + lobstertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together31 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Beef + meattop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,533 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Onions
Softened onions build the sweet, savoury flavour base of the soup.
Rich stock
Forms the liquid body of the soup.
Haddock
Pounded into the soup to add body and a delicate fish flavour.
Lobster
Its spawn and body give the soup its rich shellfish flavour and colour, and tail and claw pieces add texture.
White wine
Adds acidity that brightens the rich flavours of the soup.

The step that matters

Skimming the foam after the second boil. Foam rising during boiling carries impurities and fine particles that can make the soup cloudy and gritty. Skimming keeps the broth clear and smooth.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, ham, beef, meat, haddock, lobster, pepper):

  1. Potatofits about as well
  2. Mustardfits about as well
  3. Onionthe original
  4. Capsicumfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, ham, beef, meat, haddock, lobster, pepper. 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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