Skip to main content
Main

Pickled Oysters

Oysters pickled in liquor, vinegar, allspice, mace, cloves, salt, cayenne, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Margaret Brown · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 12 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Allspice and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Pickled Oysters

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Combine 50 large oysters, 1/2 pint liquor, 1/2 pint vinegar, 1 tablespoon allspice and cloves, 1/2 dozen mace leaves, salt to taste, and cayenne pepper.

  2. Heat the liquor and vinegar over fire until boiling.

Cook and pickle

  1. When boiling, drop a few oysters at a time and cook just long enough to curl, not over two minutes.

  2. Remove the oysters and place them in a jar.

  3. After all oysters are removed, pour the liquor over them and seal the jar tightly.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

108Calories
10 gProtein
3 gFat
10 gCarbs

Counts 7 of 9 ingredients. The other 2 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 7 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Oyster6 medium (84g)81
Clove1 tsp ground (2g)7
Cayenne1 tsp (1.8g)6
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Allspice1 tsp ground (1.9g)5
Vinegar1 tbsp (15ml) distilled3
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Liquornot in our table0
Macenot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Margaret Brown. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

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. See the original page.

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. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Allspice + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Mace + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Allspice + macetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

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

What each ingredient does

Oysters
Form the dish's main body; brief cooking firms and curls them without toughening.
Vinegar
Provides the acidity that sharpens flavor and preserves the oysters in the pickling liquid.
Allspice
Adds warm, aromatic spice flavor to the pickling liquor.

The step that matters

Cooking the oysters just until they curl. Oysters turn rubbery when overcooked, and the proteins tighten quickly with heat. Pulling them as soon as they curl, within about two minutes, keeps them tender before they go into the pickle.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (vinegar, allspice, oyster, clove, pepper):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, allspice, oyster, clove, pepper. 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.

You might also like

Mock Oyster SoupMock Oyster Soup21 recipesCorn FrittersCorn Fritters6 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipes