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Broiled Lobster

Broiled lobster is cooked by cutting it in half, buttering, broiling, and serving with butter, salt, cayenne, and lemon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Broiled Lobster

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Select a live lobster and place it, claws down, on a board.

  2. Grasp it by the back of the body shell and make an incision across the back at the hinge between the body and tail.

  3. Turn it over and cut it in half lengthwise, discarding the gills, stomach, intestinal vein, and small claws.

  4. Crack the shells of the large claws and brush the meat with melted butter.

Broil and serve

  1. Place the lobster in a greased broiler, flesh side down, and cook for 8 minutes.

  2. Then expose the shell side to the fire for 10 minutes.

  3. Serve immediately in the shell with melted butter, salt, cayenne, and lemon slices.

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 + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

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

  2. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

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

  4. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

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

  5. Lobster + peppertop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,247 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
Forms the main body of the dish; its flesh turns firm and opaque as it cooks.
Melted butter
Adds richness and moisture, carrying flavor over the lobster meat as it cooks.
Lemon
Adds acidity that brightens the rich lobster and butter.

The step that matters

Broiling flesh side down, then shell side. Cooking the flesh side first protects the delicate meat from direct heat, while the shell side finishing period completes cooking. Overcooking makes lobster meat tough and rubbery, so timing matters.

“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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