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Escaloped Oysters

Oysters topped with butter, breadcrumbs, salt, pepper, milk, and Parmesan cheese, baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 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 ↓

Escaloped Oysters

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Remove the gills from the oysters and place them in a baking dish.

Assemble and bake

  1. Melt butter and mix with bread crumbs, coarse sea salt, and black pepper.

  2. Pour milk over the oysters and sprinkle the breadcrumb mixture on top.

  3. Grate Parmesan cheese over the breadcrumbs.

  4. Bake for 15-20 minutes until golden brown.

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

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

  3. Butter + parmesan cheesetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,163 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Oysters
Form the main body of the dish and release their liquor as they cook.
Butter
Adds fat that helps the breadcrumbs brown and gives a rich flavour.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden topping that protects the oysters from drying out.
Milk
Adds moisture and mildness to the sauce around the oysters.
Parmesan cheese
Adds savoury flavour and helps the top brown further in the oven.

The step that matters

Bake for 15-20 minutes until golden brown. Oysters overcook quickly and turn rubbery when heated too long. Watch for a golden top and stop baking once the topping browns, so the oysters stay tender.

“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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