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Scalloped Oysters

Scalloped oysters are baked with bread crumbs, egg, butter, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and butter 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 ↓

Scalloped Oysters

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Drain the oysters and season them with coarse sea salt and Cayenne pepper.

  2. In a bowl, mix the stale bread crumbs with coarse sea salt and black pepper.

  3. For every ½ cup of bread crumbs, add one hard boiled egg, finely chopped.

Assemble

  1. Butter a deep dish and layer the egg and crumbs mixture, followed by a layer of oysters.

  2. Dot the oysters with small lumps of butter, then add more crumbs, repeating the layers until all ingredients are used.

  3. Finish with a top layer of crumbs.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven until hot and serve immediately.

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

  4. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  5. Oyster + eggtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,103 recipes

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

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Oysters
Provide the main savoury flavour and tender, briny body of the dish.
Stale bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and give the layers structure and a soft, absorbent texture.
Hard boiled egg
Adds richness and body to the crumb layers as it binds with the crumbs.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, helping the top brown and the crumbs taste rich.

The step that matters

Bake until hot and serve immediately. Oysters overcook quickly and turn rubbery when heated too long, so they should be heated just until hot and served right away before they firm up and lose moisture.

“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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