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Devilled Oysters
Put a layer of raw oysters in a pan, and then a layer of bread crumbs, black and red pepper, salt, butter, mustard, and a little vinegar mixed together. Put alternate layers of each until full, and then bake.--Mrs. Duke. Devilled Oysters.
Drain one quart oysters; chop thoroughly and season with cayenne pepper, lemon-juice, salt, and yolks of two hard-boiled eggs, and yolks of two raw eggs beaten and stirred in; one-half as much bread crumbs as you have oysters, and one large table-spoonful butter.
Have ready one dozen deep shells, nicely cleaned, and fill them with the oysters; sprinkle with bread crumbs, and bake in a few minutes.--Mrs. H.S. To Cook Oysters.
Put into a baking-bowl a layer of cracker-crumbs, pepper and butter. If the butter is salty do not use any salt. Then a layer of oysters, after they have been drained from their liquor; do this alternately till the dish is full. Be sure and put the cracker crumbs at the top of the dish, and bits of butter, also pepper: this makes it brown nicely. Set it in a hot oven; as soon as browned it will be ready for the table.--Mrs. P.W.
Three versions of the same idea from three contributors: oysters layered or bound with crumbs, sharpened with pepper and mustard, and baked until brown. None gives a temperature or a time, so the working knowledge has to be supplied.
- The hinge: bake hot and fastOysters throw liquor and toughen the moment they overcook. A hot oven, around 425-450F, and pull the dish as soon as the crumbs brown and the oyster edges curl, roughly 10-15 minutes for a layered dish and 6-8 for filled shells. These are modern working figures; the only oven guidance in the text is Mrs. P.W.'s 'hot oven', while Mrs. H.S.'s 'bake in a few minutes' suggests a short bake.
- "Devilled" means the mustard and cayenneIn this period devilled usually signifies a hot, sharp seasoning rather than a technique, though it was often applied to grilled or broiled dishes. Mrs. Duke's mustard, red pepper and vinegar are the point of her dish; about a teaspoon of dry mustard and a tablespoon of vinegar per pint of oysters is a reasonable starting point.
- Quantities of oystersA quart of shucked oysters weighs roughly 2 lb with its liquor, perhaps 40-50 medium oysters depending on grade. That should fill the dozen shells of the second recipe, and serves four to six as a first course.
- Drain them, and keep the liquorTwo of the three recipes drain the oysters (Mrs. Duke's does not say), and for good reason: undrained oysters flood the crumbs. The strained liquor is worth keeping for a sauce or a chowder rather than pouring away.
- Deep shellsThe bottom (cupped) half of the oyster shell, scrubbed and boiled. If you have none, ceramic scallop shells or 4 oz ramekins work; set them on a sheet pan, since they tip.
- Egg yolks as the binderTwo hard-boiled yolks mashed in plus two raw yolks beaten in is a classic binding. A bake of only a few minutes may not bring the raw yolks to a safe temperature, so bake until the filling is properly set.
- CrumbsThe recipes do not say whether the bread crumbs are dry or fresh; dry crumbs brown better. Mrs. P.W.'s cracker crumbs mean plain soda or water crackers rolled fine, not a sweetened cracker. Half as much crumb as oyster, as the second recipe specifies, is a good ratio for all three.
- Salt and the butterMrs. P.W.'s warning still applies: nineteenth-century butter was often heavily salted, and oysters bring their own salt. Season at the end rather than the start.
Housekeeping in Old Virginia (1879), compiled by Marion Cabell Tyree, was a contributor cookbook, which is why the same dish appears three times over with three different names attached. Oysters were then a cheap, abundant staple of the Chesapeake and tidewater Virginia, shipped inland by rail and barrel in enormous quantity. "Devilling" as a name for aggressively peppered and mustarded food is generally traced to English cookery of the late eighteenth century, and by the 1870s it attached to almost anything hot enough to justify it: kidneys, ham, crab, biscuits and oysters alike. The three recipes here also show the two structures the dish took, the layered scalloped pan and the shell filled with chopped, egg-bound forcemeat, both of which survived into twentieth-century American cooking.