Why it works: Celery and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,810 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. 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 the crust
Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
Roll out the pastry to ⅛ inch thickness and cover an inverted deep pie pan.
Prick the pastry with a fork to ensure even rising while baking.
Place the pie pan on a baking sheet to prevent the edges from touching the oven bottom.
Make the cover
Shape a cover from the pastry, about ¼ inch thick and slightly larger than the pie pan.
Chill the pastry cover and bake for about 20 minutes.
Fill and serve
Remove the baked pastry from the dish and place it on a serving dish.
Fill the pie with the drained oysters, plumped in their own liquor.
Reheat the oysters in the hot cream sauce, seasoned with salt, pepper, celery salt, and nutmeg.
Place the pastry cover on the pie and garnish the serving platter with parsley.
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.
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Celery + parsleytop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together6,810 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
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Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together34,122 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
-
Nutmeg + parsleytop 3% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together5,062 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
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Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together16,012 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
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Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together13,015 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Oysters
- Main filling that supplies the dish's briny, savoury flavour.
- Cream sauce
- Adds moisture and richness, keeping the oyster filling soft and creamy.
- Rich pastry
- Forms the structure of the pie shell and cover, becoming crisp and golden when baked.
The step that matters
Reheat the oysters gently in the sauce. Oyster flesh toughens and shrinks when overheated. The oysters should warm through in the hot sauce without being allowed to boil.
Swap the nutmeg
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (oyster, cream, sauce, pepper, celery, parsley):
- Tarragonfits better
- Capersfits about as well
- Thymefits about as well
- Nutmegthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against oyster, cream, sauce, pepper, celery, parsley. 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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