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Mock Oysters of Corn

A fried corn fritter shaped like an oyster, made with grated corn, flour, egg yolks, pepper, salt, and fried in lard and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Corn and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,324 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Mock Oysters of Corn

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the batter

  1. Grate the corn off the cob as finely as possible.

  2. Mix the grated corn with flour, beaten egg yolks, pepper, and salt until well combined.

Fry and serve

  1. Heat equal parts lard and butter in a frying pan until boiling hot.

  2. Drop portions of the mixture into the hot fat, shaping them like fried oysters.

  3. Fry until brown and 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. Corn + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,324 recipes

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

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Corn + flourtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,165 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Corn + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,345 recipes

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

  5. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Young corn
Provides the main bulk and sweet corn flavour of the fritters.
Egg yolks
Bind the grated corn and flour together and add richness to the batter.
Flour
Absorbs moisture from the corn and helps the fritters hold their shape.
Lard and butter
Fat for frying that browns the outside and adds flavour.

The step that matters

Heating the fat until boiling hot. If the fat is not hot enough, the fritters absorb grease and turn soggy instead of forming a crisp, browned crust. Very hot fat seals the outside quickly so the inside cooks through.

“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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