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Oyster Pie

A savory pie filled with oysters, cream, wine, and spices, baked in pastry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: White wine and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,832 recipes. Both carry myrcene, which smells balsamic, herbaceous. The science ↓

Oyster Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Line the pans or plates with pastry and bake until golden.

Make the filling

  1. In a saucepan, combine the oyster juice, mace, white wine, and lemon juice.

  2. Heat the mixture until scalding.

  3. Stir in the cream thickened with a little flour and add the oysters.

  4. Heat the mixture until just scalded.

Assemble and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into the prepared dishes.

  2. If desired, bake an upper crust separately and place it on top before serving.

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. White wine + lemontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  2. Oyster + white winetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together518 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

  3. Mace + white winetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,329 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  4. White wine + creamtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,760 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Oysters
Provide the main flavor and texture of the filling.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, silky body to the filling.
Flour
Thickens the cream so the filling holds together rather than running thin.
White wine
Adds acidity and aroma that brighten the rich cream and oysters.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that sharpens the flavor of the oysters and cream.
Pastry
Forms the golden crust that holds the filling in the pans.

The step that matters

Heat the oysters until just scalded. Oysters toughen and shrink when overheated, so they should be warmed only until the edges curl, keeping them tender and juicy.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (oyster, white wine, lemon, cream, flour):

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against oyster, white wine, lemon, cream, flour. 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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