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Deviled Oysters in Shell

Oysters baked with butter, Worcestershire sauce, mustard, hot sauce, pepper, salt, breadcrumbs, and parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 ↓

Deviled Oysters in Shell

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Remove the oysters from their shells and place them on a baking dish.

Make and top

  1. In a small bowl, mix butter, Worcestershire sauce, mustard, hot sauce, black pepper, and salt.

  2. Spoon the mixture over the oysters.

  3. Sprinkle breadcrumbs and parsley on top.

Bake

  1. Bake for 10-12 minutes until golden and bubbly.

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. Mustard + parsleytop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,588 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  3. Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Oyster + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,184 recipes

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

  5. Sauce + mustardtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,120 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Oysters
Provide the main seafood body that the buttery topping is baked over.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, carrying the seasonings and helping the topping brown.
Breadcrumbs
Form a crisp, golden crust on top of the topping during baking.
Dijon mustard
Adds sharp tang and emulsifying body that rounds out the buttery sauce.

The step that matters

Bake until golden and bubbly. Oysters cook quickly and turn rubbery if overbaked, while the topping needs enough heat to brown. Watching for golden, bubbling edges signals the topping is set and the oysters are just cooked.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (oyster, butter, sauce, pepper, parsley):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Carrotfits about as well
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against oyster, butter, sauce, pepper, parsley. 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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