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Scalloped Oysters

Scalloped oysters are baked oysters topped with sauce, lemon juice, breadcrumbs, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Scalloped Oysters

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Remove gills from oysters and cut large ones in half.

  2. Season the oysters well.

  3. Grease scallop shells with butter.

Assemble

  1. Add a thin layer of sauce at the bottom of each shell.

  2. Place 4 or 5 oysters in each shell.

  3. Add a few drops of lemon juice to each shell.

  4. Cover with sauce.

  5. Sprinkle with browned breadcrumbs.

Bake

  1. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) for 5 minutes until very hot.

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. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Oyster + saucetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Sauce + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Lemon + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

Sauce and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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
Provide the main flavour and the tender, briny filling of the dish.
Sauce
Keeps the oysters moist and surrounds them with a creamy, binding layer while baking.
Browned breadcrumbs
Form a crisp, golden topping through browning in the oven.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rich sauce and sharpens the oyster flavour.

The step that matters

Bake until very hot. Oysters cook quickly and turn rubbery if overheated, while underheated sauce stays cold and the breadcrumbs will not brown. Heat only until the shells are steaming hot and the topping is golden.

“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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