Skip to main content
Main

Scalloped Oysters

A baked oyster dish with bread crumbs, cream, butter, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Scalloped Oysters

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 the layers

  1. Do not drain the liquor from the oysters; fork them out as you use them.

  2. Cover the bottom of a well-buttered dish with a layer of dry bread crumbs.

  3. Sprinkle the crumbs with salt and pepper.

  4. Dot the crumbs with small pieces of butter.

  5. Moisten the crumbs with cream.

  6. Layer oysters and bread crumbs alternately until the dish is filled.

  7. Finish with butter and cream on top.

Bake and brown

  1. Cover the dish with a plate to retain flavor.

  2. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for 45 minutes or until the juices bubble.

  3. Remove the plate.

  4. Brown the dish for an additional 2-3 minutes.

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

  5. Bread + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Oysters
Provide the main flavor and tender body of the dish, with their liquor adding brininess.
Bread crumbs
Absorb the cream and liquor, forming a soft, set structure between the oyster layers.
Cream
Moistens the crumbs and bakes into a rich, custard-like sauce that binds the dish.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that helps the top brown and the crumbs taste savory.

The step that matters

Cover the dish with a plate while baking. The plate traps steam so the oysters cook gently and the crumbs stay moist; removing it before the final browning lets the top colour without drying the dish.

“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.

You might also like

Brown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesWhite BreadWhite Bread80 recipesBread OmeletteBread Omelette60 recipesOatmeal BreadOatmeal Bread51 recipes