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Lobster Cutlets

Lobster cutlets are breaded and fried pieces of lobster meat mixed with butter, flour, milk, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley 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 Cutlets

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the lobster

  1. Remove the flesh from the lobster and chop it into small pieces.

  2. Pound the spawn (if any) with 4 oz. of butter and pass it through a fine sieve.

Make the custard

  1. Melt 1 oz. of butter in a small saucepan, stir in the flour, add the milk, and boil well.

  2. Add the lobster, cream, spawn, cayenne, and salt to the mixture, and mix well.

  3. Turn the mixture onto a plate to cool until firm enough to mold.

Fry and serve

  1. Shape the mixture into cutlets, cover them with egg and breadcrumbs, and fry in hot fat until browned.

  2. Arrange the cutlets in a circle, placing a piece of lobster feeler in each to represent a bone, and garnish with fried 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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Lobster
Provides the main flesh and flavor, forming the body of the cutlets.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, enriching the mixture and carrying flavor.
Flour
Thickens the milk into a binding sauce that holds the cutlets together.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the sauce, giving the mixture a soft, creamy texture.
Egg
Binds the breadcrumb coating so it adheres and sets when fried.
Breadcrumbs
Forms a crisp outer crust that browns when fried.

The step that matters

Cooling the mixture until firm. The mixture must chill until it is set enough to shape. If it is too soft, the cutlets will not hold their form and may fall apart in the hot fat.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Tarragonfits about as well
  3. Parsleythe original
  4. Capersfits about as well

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