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Oyster Croquettes

Oyster croquettes are small fried cakes made from oysters, egg yolks, butter, flour, cream, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream 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 ↓

Oyster Croquettes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the oysters

  1. Pick over and drain the oysters.

  2. Place them in a saucepan and heat until the edges curl.

  3. Drain the exuded liquor and measure it.

  4. If less than ½ cup, add raw liquor to make up the difference.

  5. Slice the oysters thinly with a silver knife.

Make the filling

  1. In a double boiler, heat the cream and measured liquor.

  2. Stir in the flour and butter mixed into a paste.

  3. Stir until thickened.

  4. Add seasonings.

  5. Cook for 2 minutes.

  6. Mix in the beaten yolks and parsley.

  7. Transfer the mixture to a greased platter.

  8. Let it cool.

Shape and fry

  1. Lightly flour your hands.

  2. Form the mixture into croquettes.

  3. Dip in beaten egg.

  4. Roll in breadcrumbs.

  5. Fry in hot fat 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 + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  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
Provide the main flavor and the soft filling texture of the croquettes.
Raw egg yolks
Thicken the filling as they set and bind it together.
Flour
Thickens the cream and oyster liquor into a binding sauce.
Butter
Adds richness and flavor to the thickened sauce.
Cream
Adds richness and body to the sauce that holds the oysters.

The step that matters

Cooling the filling before shaping. Once the sauce has thickened, it must cool until firm; warm filling is too soft to hold its shape and may burst or slump during frying.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Macethe original

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