This section is from the book "The New Cyclopaedia of Domestic Economy, and Practical Housekeeper", by Elizabeth Fries Ellet. Also available from Amazon: The New Cyclopaedia of Domestic Economy, and Practical Housekeeper.
For one hundred oysters, take four eggs, boiled hard, and chopped very fine; mix them with a sixpenny loaf crumbled or grated, and add pepper and salt to taste. Put some of the mixture in the bottom of a pie dish, and lay on it lightly a layer of oysters, previously rinsed and drained; add a few bits of butter, then cover the oysters with a layer of bread-crumbs and eggs; another layer of oysters, and so on; covering the top with bread-crumbs. Bake it three-quarters of an hour.
Make a batter with milk, flour, and eggs, beaten light. Have some lard quite hot; dip out a tablespoonful of the batter, put an oyster into it, and let it down into the boiling lard carefully and fry it on both sides?. This is a better plan than mixing the oysters and batter together.
Take them from the shells, beard them, and put them with their liquor into tin shapes made to imitate scallops, six in a shell (not more), with a little pepper and butter. Put the shells upon a gridiron over a good fire, and serve them when plump and quite hot. They are delicious this way; but to be eaten in perfection should be cooked in the room where they are eaten. Squeeze a little lemon-juice over them when they come from the fire.
Or:- They may be put singly in their under shells along with their own liquor, a little minced parsley and spice, and a bit of butter, and thus put upon the gridiron,
.to be taken off when thoroughly heated.
Beard the oysters, wash them in their own liquor, then strain it, thicken it with melted butter, or white sauce made of cream, not milk, and flour; season it with a blade of mace and a few whole peppercorns tied in a muslin bag. Simmer the oysters very gently, and serve up with sippets of bread: they will require only a few minutes, and if allowed to boil will become hard.
Wash the oysters in their liquor, and then strain it, add a glass of wine, two spoonfuls of beef-gravy, some whole pepper, a little salt, a piece of butter, and a spoonful of lemon-juice; boil the whole, stirring it until it is smooth, then put in the oysters, and warm or plump them up without boiling.
Take about a quart of the largest and finest oysters you can procure, stew them in their own liquor with some pepper, a very little mace, and some green onion chopped fine, thicken them with a little butter and a dust of flour when nearly done enough. Take two French rolls of the square sort baked in tins, cut a piece off the top, and scoop out the greater part of the crumb, fill your roll with the oysters and the liquor, and set them near the fire on a chafing-dish filled with hot coals; as the liquor soaks in fill them with more, or if you have not any left, add a little good gravy boiling-hot.
Or:- Let them first soak; then fasten in the top, cover the entire of the roll in batter, and bake it in the Dutch oven till well browned.
Or:- Mince the oysters, season them only with mace and nutmeg, and fill the rolls up with cream or rich white sauce, and bake them as above: even one large roll will make a nice little dish, and is better than the smaller sort.
 
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