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Oysters Fried

Fried oysters coated in seasoned cracker crumbs and served hot with lemon and parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Oysters Fried

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the coating

  1. Wipe the oysters perfectly dry.

  2. Beat the egg and mix it with the cream.

  3. Season the cracker crumbs with salt, pepper, and nutmeg.

  4. Dip the oysters in the seasoned crumbs, then in the beaten egg, and roll in the crumbs again.

  5. Lay the oysters flat on a plate, not touching, and let them dry for 2-3 hours.

Fry and serve

  1. Heat the deep lard until boiling.

  2. Place the oysters in a frying basket, ensuring they do not touch, and plunge them into the boiling fat for 3-5 minutes.

  3. Drain the oysters on paper near the oven door.

  4. Serve very hot, garnished with sliced lemon and parsley.

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. Lemon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Nutmeg + parsleytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

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

  5. Nutmeg + lemontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

What each ingredient does

Oysters
Main ingredient; the crumb coating surrounds them and they cook through in the hot fat.
Egg
Binds the cracker crumbs to the oysters so the coating adheres during frying.
Cream
Thins the beaten egg, helping it coat the oysters evenly and adding moisture.
Fine cracker crumbs
Form the crisp, golden breaded coating that browns in the hot fat.
Deep lard
Frying fat that conducts heat quickly, cooking the coating to crispness and browning.

The step that matters

Drying the breaded oysters before frying. Letting the coated oysters rest dry helps the coating set and stick. Moisture left on the surface turns to steam in the hot fat, which can loosen the crumbs and make them greasy.

“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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