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Curried Oysters

A spicy oyster stew with butter, curry powder, cocoa-nut, sour fruit, and vegetables, simmered and served with rice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Tamarind and tomato match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 137 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Curried Oysters

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Open the oysters into a basin, keeping their liquor.

  2. In a saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat.

  3. Add the sliced onion and fry until rich brown.

  4. Stir in more butter and the curry powder, mixing well.

Make the curry

  1. Gradually add hot water or broth, cover, and bring to a boil.

  2. Add the grated cocoa-nut and sour tamarinds or chopped apple.

  3. Simmer until the apple dissolves and the cocoa-nut is tender.

  4. Mix in the flour and water thickening and salt, then boil for 5 minutes.

  5. Add the boiled vegetable marrow and tomatoes, if using.

  6. Stir in the oysters with their liquor and the cocoa-nut milk.

  7. Let the curry stew gently for a few minutes, then add lemon juice.

Serve

  1. Serve with rice on the side.

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. Tamarind + tomatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together137 recipes

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

  2. Onion + tomatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

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

  3. Onion + tamarindtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together426 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Tamarind + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together111 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, 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

Sea oysters
Provide the main seafood flavor and tender texture, with their liquor adding savory depth.
Onion
Browns in the butter to build a sweet, deep base for the curry.
Curry powder
Supplies the spiced aroma and characteristic flavor of the dish.
Cocoa-nut
Adds body, richness and sweetness through its grated meat and milk.
Flour and water thickening
Thickens the sauce so it clings to the oysters and vegetables.
Tamarind or apple
Adds sourness that balances the richness of the coconut and butter.

The step that matters

Adding the oysters. Oysters cook quickly and turn tough and rubbery if overcooked, so they should be added near the end and only gently simmered.

Swap the cocoa

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (oyster, butter, onion, meat, tamarind, flour, tomato):

  1. Beansfits better
  2. Sesamefits better
  3. Peanutfits better
  4. Cocoathe original

Fit is the average pairing score against oyster, butter, onion, meat, tamarind, flour, tomato. 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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