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Sauce

Lobster-Sauce, or Crab-Sauce

A sauce made from lobster spawn, butter, cayenne pepper, and cream, with optional additions.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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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

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the spawn

  1. Boil the lobster until cooked, then remove the spawn.

  2. Pound the spawn with butter until smooth, discarding any coarse outer parts.

  3. Rub the mixture through a sieve into melted butter.

Finish the sauce

  1. Season with cayenne pepper.

  2. Cut the lobster meat into small dice and add to the sauce.

  3. Heat the sauce gently, avoiding boiling to preserve color.

  4. Add cream and mix well before serving.

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

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

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

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

  3. Butter + caviartop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together107 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Lobster + buttertop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,609 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

  5. Lobster + caviartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together29 recipes

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

What each ingredient does

Lobster spawn
Provides the rich flavor and orange color that give the sauce its body.
Butter
Adds fat for a smooth, glossy texture and rich flavor.
Cream
Adds moisture and softness, mellowing the sauce's richness.

The step that matters

Heat the sauce gently. Boiling can cause the butter emulsion to separate and the spawn to curdle or darken, dulling the color and texture. Gentle heat keeps the sauce smooth and bright.

“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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