Name: Lobster-sauce, or CRAB-sAUCE, for Turbot, §c.
Ingredients: 1 hen lobster (fresh and alive if possible); 2 tablespoons butter (or a little oil); Cayenne pepper to taste; Meat from the lobster tail, cut into small dice; Optional: anchovies, caviar, catsup, spices, walnut or lemon pickles; Optional: a little cream (boiled first)

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-sauce, or CRAB-sAUCE, for Turbot, §c.

Ingredients

1 hen lobster (fresh and alive if possible)
2 tablespoons butter (or a little oil)
Cayenne pepper to taste
Meat from the lobster tail, cut into small dice
Optional: anchovies, caviar, catsup, spices, walnut or lemon pickles
Optional: a little cream (boiled first)

Directions

Prepare the coral sauce

Boil the lobster and remove the spawn and coral.
Mix the spawn and coral with butter or oil until smooth.
Rub the mixture through a sieve into melted butter.

Finish the sauce

Season with cayenne pepper.
Add the diced lobster meat to the sauce and heat gently without boiling.
For added flavor, mix in optional ingredients at the table.

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.

Lobster + creamtop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,050 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,516 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Butter + caviartop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together107 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Lobster + meattop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together909 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Butter + meattop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,594 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Lobster spawn and coral: Provides the rich colour and deep, briny flavour that give the sauce its character.
Butter: Adds fat for a smooth, glossy texture and carries the flavour of the coral.
Lobster tail meat: Supplies the diced pieces of lobster that give the sauce substance and bite.

The step that matters

Heat gently without boiling. Boiling can cause the butter-based emulsion to separate and turn grainy, and it toughens the delicate lobster meat. Gentle heat keeps the sauce smooth and the meat tender.

“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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Lobster-sauce, or CRAB-sAUCE, for Turbot, §c.