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Lobster Salad

A salad of boiled lobster meat, dressed with French dressing or mayonnaise, served on lettuce or celery with olives, claws, and optional eggs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Lettuce and olive match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,580 recipes. Both carry trans-2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Lobster Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the lobster

  1. Plunge the lobster head downwards into boiling salted water for 25 minutes if medium size, or 30 minutes if large.

  2. Remove the lobster and place it in cold water for 1 minute.

  3. Break the shell and crack the claws, then remove the sand bag, entrails, and spongy parts.

  4. Save the coral, any eggs, and the fat from the shell and body.

Dress and assemble

  1. Cut the lobster into dice or tear it with two forks.

  2. Pour just enough French dressing or mayonnaise to moisten and season the lobster.

  3. Lay crisp lettuce or celery in a dish, then add the lobster and the saved fats.

  4. Pour mayonnaise over the lobster and garnish with olives and lobster claws.

  5. Sprinkle the eggs over the salad dressing or use chopped coral if no eggs are available.

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. Lettuce + olivetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,580 recipes

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

  2. Lobster + lettucetop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together411 recipes

    Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).

  3. Lobster + olivetop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together252 recipes

    Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).

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

What each ingredient does

Lobster
Provides the main sweet, firm meat that forms the body of the salad.
French dressing or mayonnaise
Moistens the lobster and adds fat and seasoning for a rich, smooth texture.
Lobster coral or eggs
Adds a rich, savoury flavour and a soft, creamy texture to the salad.

The step that matters

Boiling the lobster for the stated time. Overcooking toughens lobster meat as its proteins tighten and lose moisture, while undercooking leaves the meat unsafe and soft near the shell. Timing by size keeps the flesh tender and juicy.

Swap the lettuce

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lobster, olive):

  1. Tomatofits about as well
  2. Lettucethe original
  3. Capsicumfits about as well
  4. Mustardfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against lobster, olive. 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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