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Pigs in the Blanket
Cut very thin slices of bacon; drain one pint large oysters, wrap each oyster with a slice of the bacon and secure with a toothpick, then broil.
— Mrs. Eugene A. Chilson
A three-line receipt that assumes you know how a broiler behaves. The whole dish turns on cooking the bacon before the oysters overcook, which is the reason the bacon must be sliced paper-thin.
- The hinge: thin baconThick modern supermarket bacon will still be flabby when the oysters have shrunk to erasers. Use the thinnest bacon available, or press slices thinner between sheets of parchment, and cut each slice in half crosswise so it just laps the oyster with a slight overlap.
- A pint of oystersShucked oysters were sold by liquid measure. Counts varied by grade; a pint of "large" oysters runs to something like a dozen and a half to two dozen pieces -- enough for six or so as an appetizer.
- Drain, then dryDraining alone leaves the oysters wet enough to steam rather than sear. Blot them on a towel; the bacon will also crisp faster and adhere better.
- Broiling timeUnder a preheated broiler about 4 inches from the element, two or three minutes a side is generally enough; watch it closely. The oysters are done the moment the edges ruffle and firm; the bacon should be brown but not brittle.
- ToothpicksSoak wooden picks in water for 15 minutes or they scorch and snap under the broiler. Metal skewers threaded with several pieces at once are easier to turn.
- Fat managementBacon fat dripping onto a hot element flares. Broil on a rack set over a sheet pan, and keep the pan close at hand rather than walking away.
- ServingThey are meant to be eaten hot off the fire, traditionally on small squares of buttered toast to catch the juices. A little lemon or cayenne is a common addition and adds nothing the recipe forbids.
Bacon-wrapped oysters travel under several names: "angels on horseback" in British cookery, and in American church and grange cookbooks of the 1890s and 1900s often "pigs in blankets" — a title that only later attached itself to sausages in pastry or in dough. Recipes of this kind spread quickly in the late nineteenth century because shucked oysters, packed in ice and shipped inland by rail, had become cheap and ordinary far from the coast; an inland cook could buy them by the pint at the store much as she bought bacon. The receipt's brevity and its attribution to a named contributor are typical of the compiled community cookbook, where the point was to record a neighbor's reliable party dish, not to instruct a beginner.