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 ↓
Petits Pates of Lobster
Ingredients
Directions
In a stewpan, combine the lobster meat cut into small squares.
In a marble mortar, pound the lobster spawn with ¼ cup of butter until smooth.
Scrape the mixture into a dish and pass it through a tammy (fine sieve).
Mix the lobster spawn with a few spoonfuls of béchamel sauce, heat it, and add lemon juice and glaze.
Combine this mixture with the lobster meat and fill your petits pâtés.
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.
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Lobster + saucetop 6% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,095 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Lobster + meattop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together909 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
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Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together15,338 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,227 recipes
Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
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Meat + buttertop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,594 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lobster, meat, butter, sauce):
- Coconutfits better
- Lemonthe original
- Grapefits about as well
- Applefits about as well
Fit is the average pairing score against lobster, meat, butter, sauce. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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