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Oyster Sausages

A savory sausage made from oysters, bread crumbs, beef suet, eggs, and spices, then fried or boiled.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Eliza Acton · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Mace and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,557 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Oyster Sausages

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Rinse oysters well in strained liquor and mince, but not finely, three dozen and a half of plump native oysters.

  2. Mix the oysters with ten ounces of fine bread crumbs and ten ounces of beef suet chopped extremely small.

  3. Add a saltspoonful of salt, one of pepper, less than half the quantity of cayenne, twice as much pounded mace, and a third of a small nutmeg grated.

  4. Moisten the mixture with two unbeaten eggs, or with the yolks of three eggs and a dessertspoonful of the whites.

  5. Work the ingredients together until well blended.

  6. Set the mixture in a cool place for two or three hours before use.

Shape and cook

  1. Shape the mixture into small sausages or sausage cakes.

  2. Flour the shaped sausages.

  3. Fry them in butter until a fine light brown color.

  4. Alternatively, boil the sausages in water for three minutes, drain, let them cool, dip them into egg and bread crumbs, and broil gently until lightly colored.

  5. Cook and taste a small portion before the whole batch to adjust seasoning if required.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

102Calories
7 gProtein
6 gFat
4 gCarbs

Counts 5 of 6 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 5 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Nutmeg1 tsp ground (2.2g)12
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Cayenne1 tsp (1.8g)6
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
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 Eliza Acton. 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. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  4. Bread + nutmegtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,997 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Pepper + macetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,257 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

Pepper and mace barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,257 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Oysters (in the method)
Provide the main flavour and the bulk of the filling.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and bind the mixture so it holds its shape.
Beef suet (in the method)
Adds fat that keeps the sausages moist and tender.
Eggs
Bind the mixture together and help it set when cooked.

The step that matters

Cook and taste a small portion first. Raw oyster and seasoning flavours are hard to judge by eye, and the mixture can be over- or under-seasoned. A small test portion lets you adjust salt and spice before shaping the whole batch.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, egg, pepper, nutmeg):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, egg, pepper, nutmeg. 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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