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Lobster Pie

A baked pie with lobster, a butter‑flour‑milk sauce, egg yolk, and bread crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Lobster Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the filling

  1. Cut the lobster into pieces and place in a pie dish.

  2. Season with salt, pepper, and a squeeze of lemon juice.

Make the sauce

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan.

  2. Add the flour.

  3. Gradually stir in the milk.

  4. Add nutmeg and cayenne to taste.

  5. Stir in the egg yolk.

Bake and garnish

  1. Pour the sauce over the lobster.

  2. Cover with bread crumbs.

  3. Dot with small pieces of butter.

  4. Bake in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) for 10 minutes.

  5. Pass the yolk of the hard-boiled egg through a sieve.

  6. Chop the white finely.

  7. Use to garnish the top of the pie along with parsley.

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Parsley + nutmegtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

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

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  5. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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 pie and provides its flavour.
Flour
Thickens the butter and milk into a smooth sauce.
Butter
Enriches the sauce and browns the top of the pie.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that sets into a creamy sauce.
Egg yolk
Enriches and thickens the sauce, adding richness.
Bread crumbs
Forms a crisp, golden topping over the sauce.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Tarragonfits about as well
  4. Turmericfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against lobster, flour, butter, milk, egg, pepper, nutmeg. 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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