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Escalloped Oysters

A baked oyster dish with cracker crumbs, butter, pepper, sea salt, and milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Escalloped Oysters

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Layer and bake

  1. Sprinkle the bottom of a baking dish with cracker crumbs.

  2. Add a layer of oysters, then sprinkle with bits of butter, pepper, and coarse sea salt.

  3. Repeat layers of crumbs and oysters until the dish is full, finishing with a layer of crumbs.

  4. Pour the milk over the top layer and bake for 30 to 45 minutes.

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 + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

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

  3. Oyster + milktop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,933 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Pepper + milktop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together26,984 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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

What each ingredient does

Cracker crumbs
Form the body of the dish and soak up the milk as it bakes.
Oysters
Provide the main flavor and tender, briny texture.
Butter
Adds richness and helps the top brown as it bakes.
Rich milk
Moistens the crumbs and sets into a savory custard as it bakes.

The step that matters

Pouring the milk over the top layer. The milk must soak through all the crumb and oyster layers before baking. Too little liquid leaves the dish dry, while the baking time sets the milk into a custard that holds the layers together.

“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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