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Oyster Catchup

A liquid condiment made by boiling oysters with salt, mace, cayenne pepper, wine, and brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Wine and brandy are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,427 recipes. Both carry gamma-nonanolactone, which smells coconut, sweet. The science ↓

Oyster Catchup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the oysters

  1. Wash the oysters in their liquor.

  2. In a marble mortar, combine the oysters, salt, mace, and cayenne pepper, then pound the mixture well.

Cook and strain

  1. Add ½ pint of wine for each pint of liquor and bring to a boil.

  2. Strain the mixture through a sieve or colander and boil it again.

  3. Skim off any impurities.

Finish and bottle

  1. Add a glass of brandy to the mixture.

  2. Bottle the oyster catchup for later use.

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. Wine + brandytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,427 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  2. Mace + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,257 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Pepper + winetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,066 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Mace + brandytop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,547 recipes
  5. Mace + winetop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,435 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

Mace and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,257 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 body and savoury, briny flavour of the catchup.
Cayenne pepper
Adds heat that gives the catchup its sharp, spicy character.
Wine
Adds acidity and liquid, helping to thin the mixture and carry the flavours.
Brandy
Adds aroma and a warm, spirited note added at the end.

The step that matters

Skim off any impurities. Oysters release foam and particles as they heat, and removing them keeps the finished catchup clear and clean-tasting rather than cloudy or bitter.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (oyster, pepper, wine, brandy):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Clovefits better
  3. Rosemaryfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against oyster, pepper, wine, brandy. 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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