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Crayfish Pudding

A savory pudding made from boiled crayfish, butter, anchovies, lobster spawn, eggs, and soaked bread crumbs, baked in a water bath.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 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 ↓

Crayfish Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the crayfish

  1. Boil the crayfish with salt and vinegar, then pick the meat from the tails and claws.

  2. In a mortar, combine the crayfish meat, butter, anchovies, and lobster spawn; pound until smooth.

Make the pudding

  1. Transfer to a bowl and mix in the eggs one at a time, ensuring each is fully incorporated before adding the next.

  2. Add the soaked French roll crumbs and mix well.

  3. Grease a mold with clarified butter using a pastry brush.

  4. Pour the crayfish mixture into the mold and place it in a pot of boiling water, ensuring the water reaches halfway up the mold.

  5. Cover the pot and cook slowly for one hour, placing some lighted charcoal on the lid.

Serve

  1. Carefully turn the pudding out onto a dish and garnish with red Italian 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.

  1. Lobster + saucetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,095 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

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

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Crayfish + lobstertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together100 recipes

    Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).

  5. Cream + saucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Crayfish
Provides the main flavour and the tender, delicate body of the pudding.
Eggs
Set during gentle cooking to bind the mixture and give the pudding its firm structure.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, moist texture to the crayfish mixture.
French roll crumbs
Soaked in cream, they add moisture and a softer texture that lightens the pudding.
Anchovies
Contribute a savoury, salty depth that enhances the seafood flavour.

The step that matters

Cook slowly in a water bath. Eggs set gently and evenly when cooked slowly in water that reaches halfway up the mold. High heat would curdle the eggs and leave the pudding rough and porous.

“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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