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Oyster Patties

A savory patty made from oysters, butter, flour, cream, and seasonings, cooked into a thick sauce and shaped into patties.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,318 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Oyster Patties

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the oysters

  1. Scald the oysters in their own liquor, being careful not to leave them in after it boils.

  2. Remove the oysters and cut them into fine pieces if large.

Make the sauce

  1. In a saucepan, melt the butter and add the flour.

  2. Pour in the strained oyster liquor and cream, then add salt and white pepper.

  3. Boil while stirring until smooth.

  4. Beat the egg yolks and add them along with the cut oysters to the sauce.

  5. Heat everything together, stirring constantly until very thick, just before boiling.

  6. Remove from heat, stirring continuously to prevent the eggs from curdling.

  7. Add a few drops of lemon juice and a pinch of nutmeg.

Fill the patties

  1. Place the mixture in pattie pan shapes.

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. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

Butter and flour 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

Oysters
Provide the main flavour and tender pieces that fill the patties.
Flour
Thickens the butter and oyster liquor into a smooth base for the sauce.
Egg yolks
Thicken the sauce as it heats and give it a rich, smooth body.
Cream
Adds richness and moisture, softening the sauce's texture.
Butter
Adds fat and flavour, and helps form the roux with the flour.
Oyster liquor
Adds the concentrated sea flavour that the sauce is built on.

The step that matters

Heat the egg yolks gently and stir constantly. Egg yolks thicken by setting when heated, but if the sauce gets too hot or sits still, they scramble and curdle. Keeping it below boiling while stirring lets the yolks thicken it evenly and smoothly.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (oyster, butter, flour, cream, egg, lemon, nutmeg):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Cinnamonfits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against oyster, butter, flour, cream, egg, lemon, nutmeg. 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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