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Corn Oysters

Corn oysters are fried corn fritters made with corn, milk, egg, flour, and seasonings.

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 ↓

Corn Oysters

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Combine the corn, cream or milk, salt, pepper, and egg in a bowl.

  2. Add flour gradually until the mixture is a thick batter, similar to pancake batter.

Fry and drain

  1. Heat lard in a deep pan until boiling.

  2. Drop large spoonfuls of the batter into the hot lard.

  3. Fry until golden brown.

  4. Remove and drain on paper towels.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Cream + flourtop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Corn
Provides the main bulk, sweetness and texture of the fritters.
Egg
Binds the batter so the fritters hold together while frying.
Flour
Thickens the batter and gives the fritters their structure.
Cream or milk
Adds moisture and richness, loosening the batter with the flour.

The step that matters

Frying in hot lard. The lard must be hot enough before the batter goes in. Hot fat sears the outside quickly, forming a crisp golden crust and limiting how much oil the batter absorbs. If the fat is too cool, the fritters soak up grease and turn heavy and greasy.

“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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