I slightly adapted this
recipe. Original recipe from Mary and Vincent Price's 1969 cookbook
Come into the Kitchen Cookbook: A Collector's Treasury of America's
Great Recipes. You can eat these delightful oysters right out of the
jar or serve as an appetizer. They are also delicious served on a bed
off crisp greens or mixed with sliced cucumber for a summer salad.
Pickled oysters were very popular
in the United States around the turn-of-the-century (late 1800s and early
1900a). They were especially popular during the Christmas holidays. New York
City and the waters surrounding it were once the richest oyster beds in the
world. New Yorkers, rich and poor, ate obscene numbers of oysters and shipped
barrels of fresh and pickled oysters across America and around the world.
Check out more of Linda's great
Oyster Recipes and also check out
How To Shuck Oysters.
Pickled Oysters Recipe
Recipe Type:
Oysters,
Lemons,
Peppercorns
Yields: serves many
Prep time: 20 min
Ingredients:
4 dozen small fresh
oysters, shucked*
8 whole peppercorns
1 teaspoon sea
saltor coarse salt
1/4 teaspoon ground mace
3 tablespoons white
wine
1/4 cup cider vinegar or fresh-squeezed
lemon juice**
2 tablespoons sherry wine
6 drops
Tabasco sauce
* Learn
How To Shuck Oysters (with photo tutorial).
** I like to use fresh-squeezed lemon juice.
Preparation:
Shuck the oysters and put them, along with their liquor, into a sauté pan; simmer over
medium heat until they begin to curl around the edges. Using
a slotted spoon, remove the cooked oysters and plunge into a
bowl of ice cubes and cold water to stop the cooking
process; drain the oysters and set aside.
Add peppercorns, salt,
mace, wine, vinegar or lemon juice, sherry, and Tabasco sauce to the hot
oyster liquor; simmer over low for 10 minutes. Remove
pickling sauce from heat and let cool.
Put the cooked oysters into
a quart container with a lid, then pour the cooled pickling sauce over.
Cover tightly and
refrigerate at least 24 hours before serving to allow flavors to blend.
Will keep in the
refrigerator up to 5 days.
