Skip to main content
Main

Oysters and Macaroni

A baked casserole of macaroni and oysters topped with cheese and buttered breadcrumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Oyster and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,545 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Oysters and Macaroni

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Boil the macaroni until tender.

  2. Cut the boiled macaroni into short pieces.

Assemble

  1. In a baking dish, layer macaroni, then oysters, repeating until all ingredients are used. Ensure the top layer is macaroni.

  2. Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese or bits of American cheese.

  3. Cover with buttered bread crumbs.

Bake

  1. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for about 20 minutes until the top is browned.

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. Oyster + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,545 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  2. Parmesan cheese + breadtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together577 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Oyster + parmesan cheesetop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together111 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

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

What each ingredient does

Macaroni
Forms the starchy body of the dish and holds the layers together.
Oysters
Provide the main flavour and a tender, moist texture as they cook in the oven.
Parmesan cheese or soft american cheese
Melts over the top and helps the surface brown and turn golden.
Buttered bread crumbs
Add a crisp, golden crust on top while the layers below stay moist.

The step that matters

Ensure the top layer is macaroni. Placing macaroni on top shields the delicate oysters from direct heat, so they cook gently and do not dry out or toughen while the crumbs brown.

“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.

More oyster macaroni recipes

Casserole 6Baked 3 See all 11 →

You might also like

Brown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesMacaroni and CheeseMacaroni and Cheese102 recipesWhite BreadWhite Bread80 recipesBread OmeletteBread Omelette60 recipes