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Creamed Oysters

A sauce of butter, flour, and oyster liquor served with oysters.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Creamed Oysters

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the oysters

  1. Cook the oysters in their own liquor until plump and their edges curl.

  2. Drain off the liquor.

Make the sauce

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan and stir in the flour, salt, and pepper or paprika.

  2. Slowly add the oyster liquor and cream or milk, stirring continuously.

  3. Cook for 10 minutes, then add the oysters.

  4. Reheat the oysters in the sauce for 5 minutes.

Serve

  1. Serve on toast or in patty shells, timbale cases, or bread boxes.

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. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  4. Oyster + creamtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,886 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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
Are the main ingredient, cooked gently until plump so they stay tender.
Butter
Forms the fat base of the roux, adding richness and flavor to the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the butter and liquid into a smooth, creamy sauce.
Cream or milk
Adds moisture and richness, giving the sauce its smooth, creamy body.
Oyster liquor
Adds the oysters' own briny flavor to the sauce and thins it as it cooks.

The step that matters

Adding the liquid to the roux. Pour the oyster liquor and cream in slowly while stirring constantly. Adding liquid too fast lets flour clump into lumps that stay in the sauce, so it will not turn smooth.

“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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