Fried Oysters
Shucked oysters rolled in seasoned cornmeal and flour and fried for about 2 minutes a side until crisp outside and plump inside.
Photograph credit: Fried Oysters by Kanesue · CC BY 2.0 · Flickr
Why do fried oysters go wrong so often? Because they are cooked too long. An oyster is mostly water and protein, and it turns from plump and briny to rubbery and small in the time it takes to answer a message. The fat should be hot and the cooking time short.
Buy shucked oysters in their liquor, drain them, and pat them dry. If you have fresh ones, open them yourself and keep the liquid for another dish. A damp oyster makes the coating slide off, and the surface moisture hits the oil as steam and spits. Season them, then coat in flour first, then egg, then the cornmeal mixture.
Mix cornmeal with flour, not on its own. Plain cornmeal gives a gritty, heavy coating that can taste dry, while a mix of two parts cornmeal to one part flour gives a crunchy shell with a tender edge. Cayenne, paprika and salt in the mix give it its Southern character.
Fry at 190°C / 375°F in about 5 cm of oil, 6 oysters at a time. They are done in 2 minutes, when the coating is golden and floats. Drain on a rack and serve with lemon, hot sauce and tartare sauce.
The Method for Fried Oysters
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Pat the oysters dry. Put the 60 g flour in one bowl, the eggs in a second and the cornmeal, 50 g flour, paprika, cayenne and salt in a third.
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Heat the oil in a deep frying pan to 190°C / 375°F.
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Coat each oyster in flour, then egg, then the cornmeal mix, pressing firmly.
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Fry 6 at a time for 2 minutes, turning once, until golden. Drain on a wire rack.
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Serve immediately with the lemon wedges and tartare sauce.
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Worth Getting Right
- Dry the oysters well before coating.
- Fry quickly: 2 minutes is enough.
- Keep the oil at 190°C / 375°F.
Serve It With
Tartare sauce · Hot sauce · Coleslaw · Chips
Storage
Best eaten at once. They do not reheat well.
Fried Oysters Nutrition Facts
No nutrition figures are given for this recipe: they cannot be worked out reliably from its ingredient list (how much frying oil the food takes up cannot be known from the recipe). Why some recipes have none.
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Compiled by Turab
Checked by script for timings, diet labels and nutrition arithmetic. How the recipes are checked. Found a mistake? Tell us.
First published ; last changed .
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