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Fricasseed Oysters

A buttery oyster dish with parsley, cayenne, flour, and egg yolks, served hot with fried bread.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper 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 ↓

Fricasseed Oysters

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Remove the gills from the oysters and drain them well.

  2. In a skillet, brown 2 tablespoons of butter.

  3. Add the parsley, cayenne, and salt to the browned butter.

Cook and serve

  1. Mix the flour with the remaining butter and stir into the oysters when they begin to curl.

  2. Add the beaten egg yolks and remove from heat immediately.

  3. Serve on a hot dish garnished with fried bread and 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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Parsley + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,675 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 + eggtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,103 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
The main ingredient, which firm up and curl as they heat through.
Butter
Adds richness and a nutty, browned flavor to the dish.
Flour
Thickens the butter and oyster liquor into a light sauce.
Egg yolks
Enrich and thicken the sauce as their proteins set gently with heat.

The step that matters

Adding the egg yolks and removing from heat immediately. Egg yolk proteins set at moderate heat, so if the sauce stays on the burner it can curdle or turn grainy. Removing the pan right away keeps the sauce smooth and creamy.

Swap the parsley

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against oyster, butter, flour, pepper, egg. 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.

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