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Oyster Fritters

A fried batter of eggs, bread crumbs, flour, milk, pepper, salt, and oysters.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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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 ↓

Oyster Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Beat the eggs in a bowl and mix in enough bread crumbs and flour to create a stiff batter.

  2. Add milk gradually until the desired consistency is reached, then season with pepper and coarse sea salt.

Fry

  1. Heat equal portions of butter and lard in a frying pan.

  2. Drop a spoonful of batter into the pan, adding one or two oysters on top.

  3. Cook until brown, then turn carefully.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Butter + oystertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,184 recipes

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

Flour and butter 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

Eggs
Bind the batter and help it set firm as it cooks.
Bread crumbs
Add body to the batter so it holds together as a stiff mixture.
Flour
Thickens the batter and helps it hold its shape in the pan.
Butter and lard
Fry the fritters, adding flavor and browning the outside.
Oysters
Provide the main flavor and are set into each fritter as it cooks.

The step that matters

Turn the fritters carefully once brown. The batter is only partly set when first dropped in, so it can break apart if turned too early or roughly. Wait until the underside is well browned and firm before flipping.

“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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