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Oysters, Gianella
Place thirty-six freshly opened oysters in an enamelled pan with their own liquor, a gill white wine, and let boil for six minutes. Lift up with a skimmer, place in six egg-cocotte dishes, six in each dish, and skim scum off surface of broth in which oysters were cooked. Finely chop six sound shallots, place in a small saucepan with an ounce fresh butter, fry for three minutes, add an ounce flour, stir well, then pour in the broth. Sharply mix until it comes to a boil, add four anchovies in oil cut in quarters, half teaspoon each freshly chopped tarragon and salt, a saltspoon cayenne, lightly mix and let boil for five minutes. Add an egg yolk, sharply mix, evenly pour sauce over the six dishes, lightly turn oysters with a fork and place dishes on a tin. Sprinkle a little fresh bread crumbs over, set to bake in oven for six minutes or until a nice golden colour, remove and serve.
A late-Victorian oyster gratin scaled for six ramekins. Everything here works except the cooking times, which come from an era when oysters were cooked until they were unmistakably cooked.
- The hinge: cut the poaching timeSix minutes at a boil, followed by six more in the oven, will give you rubbery oysters. Bring the liquor and wine barely to a simmer and lift the oysters out as soon as their edges ruffle, about one to two minutes; they finish in the oven.
- A gillHalf a cup, four fluid ounces. Thirty-six shucked oysters will release roughly a cup of their own liquor, which with the wine gives you enough broth for the sauce.
- Egg-cocotte dishesSmall straight-sided ramekins of about 4 ounces, one per person. Standard 6-ounce ramekins work; anything wider and the sauce spreads too thin to protect the oysters.
- Oven heatNo temperature is given, as is common in cookbooks of this period. For a six-minute browning, 425-450F, or finish under the broiler for two minutes.
- SaltspoonA quarter teaspoon. A quarter teaspoon of cayenne across six portions is assertive but not unreasonable; start with half that if you are unsure.
- Salt and anchoviesFour oil-packed anchovies plus the oyster liquor carry a great deal of salt already. Hold back the half teaspoon of salt until you have tasted the finished sauce.
- The egg yolkTake the pan off the heat, slacken the yolk with a spoonful of the hot sauce, then stir it back in. Added straight to a boiling sauce it will curdle into threads.
- Why enamelledOyster liquor and white wine are acidic and will pick up a metallic taste from bare cast iron or unlined aluminium. Enamel, stainless or a glazed pan all serve.
- YieldSix first-course servings. With bread and a salad it makes a light supper for three.
The International Cook Book belongs to the great age of American oyster cookery, when oysters were cheap enough to be eaten by the dozen in chophouses and hotel dining rooms up and down the Atlantic coast, and cookbooks carried dozens of variations distinguished only by their garnish and their dedicatee. Dishes named for individuals s a patron, a colleague, a singer who had dined well s were often said to be a professional way of labelling a variation, and the name Gianella may commemorate a person rather than a place; who, is no longer recoverable. What is documented is the form: oysters poached in their own liquor, bound in a shallot-and-flour sauce enriched with egg yolk, crumbed and glazed, served in individual cocottes. That last detail is the period's signature, the small porcelain dish that let a hotel kitchen send out a hot gratin per guest, and the same vessel that gave its name to eggs en cocotte.