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Stewed Oysters
Drain a quart of fine oysters, and carefully remove all bits of shells. Strain the liquor, and put it in a saucepan. Bring it to a boil, and skim. Add a pint of hot milk, a tablespoonful of butter, and when at the boiling point add the oysters, a little pepper, and more salt if necessary. Cook only until the oysters begin to curl. The fire should be hot enough to cook them quickly, but care must be taken that they do not scorch after the milk is added. Serve small, crisp crackers and pickled gherkins as an accompaniment.
A short, clean stew that depends almost entirely on knowing when to stop. The recipe is sound as written; the only real risks are overcooking and scorched milk.
- The hinge: "until the oysters begin to curl"Usually a matter of a minute or two once they hit the hot liquid, and the edges ruffling is the whole signal. Past that the muscle tightens and turns rubbery.
- A quart of oystersShucked oysters were generally sold by liquid measure rather than by count, so a quart is a volume of oysters with their liquor; depending on grade that is somewhere in the range of three to four dozen. Reserve every drop of the liquor; it is the stock.
- Strain the liquor properlyOyster liquor carries grit and shell fragments even after picking the oysters over. Pour it through a fine sieve lined with a double layer of cheesecloth or a coffee filter rather than a colander.
- Scorching after the milk goes inThe instruction to keep the fire hot but avoid scorching is easier to follow with a heavy-bottomed pan and milk that is already hot. Once dairy is in, keep it off a hard boil; milk boiled with oyster liquor can separate.
- SaltOyster liquor is already saline and varies a great deal by source. Taste the boiled, skimmed liquor before adding any salt at all; often none is needed.
- ButterA tablespoon in a stew of this size is a light hand by modern standards. Two to three tablespoons, or a splash of cream in place of some of the milk, gives the body most people now expect from an oyster stew.
- YieldServes four as a first course, or two or three as a supper with the crackers. It does not reheat — the oysters cook a second time.
- The accompanimentsSmall crisp crackers means oyster crackers or common water crackers, served alongside to crumble in. The gherkins are there as a sharp counterweight to the milk, and something like cornichons does the same job.