Name: Oyster Sauce
Ingredients: oysters, strained from their liquor; butter; cream

Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and 41,516 recipes mention both. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Oyster Sauce

Ingredients

oysters, strained from their liquor
butter
cream

Directions

Prepare a drawn-butter sauce using butter and part cream.
Add the strained oysters to the sauce.
Bring the mixture to a boil.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs

Aroma overlapmoderate

Mentioned together41,516 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Oyster + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Aroma overlapmoderate

Mentioned together8,184 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).
Oyster + creamtop 17% of all pairs

Aroma overlapmoderate

Mentioned together2,886 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).