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Oyster Soup

A soup made with oysters, water, butter, milk, and seasonings, served with lemon and crackers.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Oyster Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the liquor

  1. Drain the liquor from the oysters through a colander.

  2. Put the liquor over the fire with ½ cup water, salt, pepper, and 1 tablespoon butter for each quart of soup.

  3. Let it boil.

Cook the oysters

  1. Add the oysters.

  2. Heat slowly until the oysters ruffle, about 5 minutes after boiling.

  3. Strain the soup.

Finish and serve

  1. Boil milk equal to the amount of oyster liquor in another vessel.

  2. Pour the oysters into a hot tureen.

  3. Add a large spoonful of butter and let it melt.

  4. Stir in the milk.

  5. Add the hot soup.

  6. Cover.

  7. Serve with sliced lemon and crackers.

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. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

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

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

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

  5. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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.
Butter
Adds richness and a silky mouthfeel to the broth.
Milk
Mellows the brine and gives the soup a creamy body.

The step that matters

Heat slowly until the oysters ruffle. Oysters turn tough and shrink when overheated. Gentle heat just until the edges curl keeps them plump and tender.

“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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