Oyster Sauce (No. 278)

The Cook's Oracle; and Housekeeper's ... · Kitchiner, William · 1817
Source
The Cook's Oracle; and Housekeeper's Manual
Yield
6.0 hearty fish-eaters
Status
success · extracted 13 days ago
Not a recipe
No
Ingredients (22)
For the sauce
Optional additions (discouraged)
For flavouring (recommended)
Recipe cross-references
Instructions (18)
  1. Choose plump and juicy native oysters.
  2. Do not take them out of their shell until you put them into the stew-pan.
  3. For half a dozen hearty fish-eaters, use three or four dozen oysters.
  4. Save their liquor, strain it, and put it and the oysters into a stew-pan.
  5. As soon as they boil and the oysters plump, take them off the fire.
  6. Pour the contents of the stew-pan into a sieve over a clean basin.
  7. Wash the stew-pan out with hot water.
  8. Put the strained liquor into the stew-pan with about an equal quantity of milk.
  9. Add about two ounces and a half of butter, with which you have well rubbed a large tablespoonful of flour.
  10. Boil up the mixture.
  11. Pour it through a sieve into a basin to ensure it is quite smooth, and then back again into the saucepan.
  12. Shave the oysters, and if making sauce for a 'committee of taste,' take away the gristly part also, putting in only the soft part.
  13. If the oysters are very large, cut them in half.
  14. Set the oysters by the fire to keep hot; if they boil after, they will become hard.
  15. If you do not have liquor enough, add a little melted butter, or cream (see No. 388), or milk beaten up with the yolk of an egg (this must not be put in until the sauce is done).
  16. It will greatly heighten the flavour of this sauce to pound the soft part of half a dozen unboiled oysters.
  17. Rub the pounded oysters through a hair-sieve and stir them into the sauce.
  18. Add a few grains of Cayenne, if desired, for some palates.
Original Text
Oyster Sauce.—(No. 278.) Choose plump and juicy natives for this purpose: don’t take them out of their shell till you put them into the stew-pan, see Obs. to No. 181. To make good oyster sauce for half a dozen hearty fish-eaters, you cannot have less than three or four dozen oysters. Save their liquor; strain it, and put it and them into a stew-pan: as soon as they boil, and the fish plump, take them off the fire, and pour the contents of the stew-pan into a sieve over a clean basin; wash the stew-pan out with hot water, and put into it the strained liquor, with about an equal quantity of milk, and about two ounces and a half of butter, with which you have well rubbed a large table-spoonful of flour; give it a boil up, and pour it through a sieve into a basin (that the sauce may be quite smooth), and then back again into the saucepan; now shave the oysters, and (if you have the honour of making sauce for “a committee of taste,” take away the gristly part also) put in only the soft part of them: if they are very large, cut them in half, and set them by the fire to keep hot: “if they boil after, they will become hard.” If you have not liquor enough, add a little melted butter, or cream (see No. 388), or milk beat up with the yelk of an egg (this must not be put in till the sauce is done). Some barbarous cooks add pepper, or mace, the juice or peel of a lemon, horseradish, essence of anchovy, Cayenne, &c.: plain sauces are only to taste of the ingredient from which they derive their name. Obs.—It will very much heighten the flavour of this sauce to pound the soft part of half a dozen (unboiled) oysters; rub it through a hair-sieve, and then stir it into the sauce: this essence of oyster (and for some palates a few grains of Cayenne) is the only addition we recommend. See No. 441.
Notes
—