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Oyster or Shrimp Cocktail (Individual)
6 oysters or 8 fresh cooked or 1 teaspoon Chili sauce canned shrimps 1/2 tablespoon Mazola 1/2 tablespoon lemon juice 1/2 teaspoon horseradish 1/4 teaspoon celery salt 2 or 3 drops
An individual seafood cocktail from the era when the sauce was mixed to order in the glass rather than poured from a bottle. The quantities given are for one serving.
- MazolaA corn oil brand still sold today; any neutral oil works. In a cocktail sauce this half tablespoon is there to soften the vinegar bite of the chili sauce, not to emulsify.
- Chili sauceNot a hot sauce. Early twentieth-century chili sauce was a thick, sweet-sour tomato condiment closer to a chunky ketchup. Modern bottled chili sauce of the Heinz type is the direct descendant and is the right substitute.
- HorseradishMost likely prepared horseradish in vinegar rather than freshly grated root, which is noticeably stronger; the recipe does not say which. Add it last and taste.
- AssemblyWhisk the sauce ingredients together and chill it separately from the shellfish, then spoon it over the oysters or shrimp in the glass at the moment of serving. Sauce mixed and left standing on raw oysters draws out their liquor and turns the whole thing watery.
- ShrimpEight per glass suggests small shrimp, of the size sold cooked or canned for salads. If using larger shrimp, four or five will fill the glass. Cook them just until opaque and chill quickly.
- Raw oystersBuy from a supplier who can tell you the harvest date and keep them at refrigerator temperature until shucking. Raw shellfish carries a real risk of Vibrio and norovirus, and is not advisable for pregnant women, young children, the elderly, or anyone with liver disease or a compromised immune system.
- ServingTraditionally set in a stemmed glass nested in a bowl of crushed ice, with a lemon wedge. One glass per person as a first course.
Seafood cocktails were already in American cookbooks by the 1890s and served as a light opening course, and their spread is often linked to the Prohibition years, when a "cocktail" served in a stemmed glass at the start of dinner filled the social slot the drinks course had vacated. The recipe names Mazola, a corn oil introduced by the Corn Products Refining Company, where a general cookbook would simply have said salad oil. The sauce itself is the ancestor of the bottled cocktail sauce on supermarket shelves now, mixed by hand from tomato-based chili sauce, horseradish, lemon and a few drops of something hot.