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Creamed Oysters on Toast

A creamy oyster dish served on buttered toast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Creamed Oysters on Toast

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the oysters

  1. Wash the oysters until free from shell pieces.

  2. Place them in a saucepan and strain the liquor over them.

  3. Simmer gently until the oysters plump up.

  4. Remove the oysters with a skimmer and keep them warm in the oven.

Make the cream sauce

  1. Add the cream and season with salt and pepper to the liquor.

  2. Bring the liquor to a boil, then stir in the butter mixed with flour.

  3. Once creamy, add the oysters and remove from heat.

Serve

  1. Serve the oysters on buttered toast, pouring the cream sauce over them.

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  5. Oyster + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,545 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, 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
Main ingredient that gives the dish its flavour and is cooked gently until plump.
Cream
Enriches the liquor into a smooth sauce with a rich, silky texture.
Butter
Adds richness and, mixed with flour, helps thicken the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the butter and liquor mixture so the sauce becomes creamy.

The step that matters

Stir the butter and flour into the boiling liquor. Flour must be cooked in fat and liquid long enough to thicken smoothly. Adding it to a boil without whisking can leave lumps, and overcooking can make the sauce pasty.

“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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