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Oyster Sausages

Oyster sausages are fried cakes made from oysters, veal, bread crumbs, egg, flour, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Oyster and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,545 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Oyster Sausages

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Chop the oysters and veal together.

  2. Mix in bread crumbs, salt, and pepper.

  3. Pound the mixture in a mortar until well combined.

Form and fry

  1. Form the mixture into small cakes.

  2. Dip each cake in beaten egg, then coat with flour.

  3. Fry the cakes in hot oil until golden brown.

  4. Serve hot.

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. Oyster + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,545 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

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

  3. Oyster + eggtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,103 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Bread + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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
Provide the main flavour and moisture of the filling.
Veal
Adds body and structure so the mixture holds together when shaped.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and help bind the mixture into cakes.
Egg
Binds the cakes and creates a coating that helps the flour adhere.
Flour
Forms a dry crust that browns during frying.

The step that matters

Frying the cakes in hot oil. The oil must be hot enough to brown the crust quickly. If it is too cool, the cakes absorb oil, turn greasy, and may fall apart before the outside sets.

“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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