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Cream of Oyster Soup

A creamy oyster soup made with fresh oysters, water, cream, cracker crumbs, butter, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Cream of Oyster Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the broth

  1. Drain the liquid from the oysters.

  2. Remove all shells.

  3. Strain the broth into a saucepan.

  4. Add cold water.

  5. Boil the mixture.

  6. Skim off any foam.

Make the soup

  1. Add butter before the oysters are put in.

  2. Add the oysters to the broth.

  3. Stir in the cream.

  4. Stir in the cracker crumbs.

  5. Bring to a boil.

  6. Season with salt and pepper.

  7. Serve 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. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

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

  3. Oyster + creamtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,886 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Oyster + peppertop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,663 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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 tender texture of the soup.
Cream or rich milk
Adds richness and a smooth, creamy body to the soup.
Cracker crumbs
Thicken the soup slightly as their starch absorbs liquid.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a rounded, mellow flavour.

The step that matters

Bring to a boil before adding cream. Boiling after the cream is added can cause it to curdle or separate. Adding the oysters once the broth is hot lets them cook gently and stay tender rather than toughening.

“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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