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Oyster Soup

A creamy soup made with oysters, milk, butter, and cornstarch, seasoned with salt and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Oyster Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the oysters

  1. Place a colander over a pan.

  2. Pour 1 cup of water over the oysters.

  3. Drain the oysters in the colander.

  4. Strain the oyster liquor through a fine strainer.

  5. Bring the strained liquor to a boil.

  6. Add the oysters to the boiling liquor.

  7. Keep the oysters hot.

Make the soup

  1. Boil the milk in a double boiler.

  2. Strain the liquor into the milk.

  3. Thicken the milk with butter and cornstarch.

  4. Add salt and pepper to taste.

  5. Boil for five minutes.

  6. Serve immediately.

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

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

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

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

  3. Oyster + milktop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,933 recipes

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

  4. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

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

  5. Milk + peppertop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together26,984 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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 tender texture of the soup.
Milk
Forms the creamy base of the soup.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that rounds out the soup.
Cornstarch
Thickens the milk so the soup becomes smooth and body-rich.

The step that matters

Thicken the milk with butter and cornstarch. Cornstarch must be fully mixed in and heated to a boil to gelatinize and thicken evenly. Adding it to hot liquid without blending first can cause lumps, and undercooking leaves a starchy taste.

“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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