Skip to main content
Main

Oyster Jambalaya

A spicy oyster stew with bacon, tomatoes, and rice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Tomato and rice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,065 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Oyster Jambalaya

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Heat the butter in a skillet.

  2. Add the tomatoes, salt, and bacon or ham. Cook for a few minutes.

  3. Add the oysters and cook for 10 minutes longer.

  4. Stir in the rice, cover closely, and set aside in a very warm place for about 30 minutes before serving.

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. Tomato + ricetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,065 recipes

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

  2. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Pepper + ricetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,379 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Oyster + hamtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together360 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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 texture when cooked briefly in the pan.
Bacon or ham
Adds smoky, savoury fat that flavours the pan before the oysters go in.
Tomatoes
Add acidity and moisture that help build the sauce base.
Boiled rice
Absorbs the flavoured juices and forms the bulk of the dish.

The step that matters

Adding the oysters and cooking for 10 minutes. Oysters turn tough and rubbery when overcooked, because their proteins tighten with prolonged heat. Cooking them only as long as the record states keeps them plump and tender.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (oyster, ham, pepper, butter, rice):

  1. Asparagusfits about as well
  2. Potatofits about as well
  3. Capsicumfits about as well
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against oyster, ham, pepper, butter, rice. 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.

You might also like

Tomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesCream of Tomato SoupCream of Tomato Soup107 recipesRice FrittersRice Fritters84 recipesTomato BisqueTomato Bisque61 recipes