Skip to main content
Main

Oyster Fritters

Oyster fritters are fried oysters coated in a batter of seasoned oyster liquor and cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Oyster Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the batter

  1. Blanch the oysters without boiling them.

  2. Strain the oyster liquor and season it with cayenne pepper and a few drops of essence of anchovies.

  3. Make a thick batter using the seasoned liquor and a little cream.

Fry and serve

  1. Heat lard in a stewpan until hot.

  2. Dip each oyster into the batter and fry them until golden.

  3. Serve on a napkin with fried parsley.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Oyster + creamtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,886 recipes

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

  3. Oyster + peppertop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,663 recipes

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

  4. Oyster + parsleytop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,211 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Pepper + creamtop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together21,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Pepper and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 21,449 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

Large oysters
Provide the main filling, with their briny flavour carried into the fritter.
Cream
Adds richness and moisture to the batter, helping it coat the oysters smoothly.
Lard for frying
Conducts heat for frying, giving the batter a crisp, golden browned surface.

The step that matters

Dip each oyster into the batter and fry them until golden. The lard must be hot before the oysters go in. Hot fat sets the batter quickly and browns it, while cooler fat soaks in and makes the fritters greasy and heavy.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Celeryfits about as well
  2. Nutmegfits about as well
  3. Parsleythe original
  4. Tarragonfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against oyster, pepper, cream. 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.

More oyster fritters recipes

Mock 4 See all 129 →

You might also like

Mock Oyster SoupMock Oyster Soup21 recipesCorn FrittersCorn Fritters6 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipes