Warm oysters with linden and watercress

Difficulty :
Preparation time : 15 min
Cooking time : 3 min
Number of servings : 4 persons
Type of dish : Plat principal

By chef Jean Soulard, spokesperson for Smarter Seafood.

Ingredients

24 oysters
30 g (1 oz) butter
1 chopped shallot
1 bunch of watercress, stems removed
1 linden sachet
180 ml (3/4 cup) 35% cream
salt and pepper to taste

Preparation

Open the oysters.
Keep the oyster juice in a saucepan and the oysters in a bowl.
Clean the shells and set aside.
In a frying pan, brown the butter with the shallots, add the watercress and cook for a few seconds, just long enough for the leaves to soften.
Season with salt and pepper and place the watercress in the bottom of the oyster shells. Place the fresh oysters on top of the watercress. Set aside.
In a saucepan, bring the oyster juice and a little water to the boil.
Place the linden sachet in the water, cover and leave to infuse off the heat.
After 5 minutes, remove the linden sachet, add the cream and let reduce by half. Check seasoning. Set aside for later.
At the last minute, pour the sauce over the oysters and bake for 5 minutes at 375 °F (190 °C). It is important not to overcook, as the oysters should remain soft.
Serve immediately on a bed of coarse salt to keep the oysters horizontal.

Informations

Do you know how to open oysters (without getting injured)? Maggie, animator for Les Cultures du Large, demonstrate the technique and gives some tips for the conservation and storage.

Video length: 1 minute and 55 seconds
Location and shooting date: Magdalen Islands, 2023
Excerpt from interviews conducted by: Maylis Persoons, Exploramer museologist
Videographer and editor: Guillaume Lévesque, Les productions de la Morue Salée
Interviewee:

Maggie, Les Cultures du Large

Credit: Exploramer, 2024

Transcription

[Close-up shot of Maggie’s face in profile, then of her hands holding an oyster with a cloth.]

Maggie: So, to shuck the oyster, it’s important to protect your hand. So, we’ll take a cloth. All we have to do is fold it over. That way, if the knife goes through, it protects your hand.

[Shot of inserting a small knife into the slit of a closed oyster, manipulating and then opening the oyster.]

Here, we have a slit on the tip of the oyster. That’s where we’ll place the knife. Then we’ll use the knife as a lever. We’ll twist it or just tilt it downwards a little. To open the shell, that way. We’ll pass the knife around the oyster. Then we’re going to detach the muscle here, which is attached to the shell.

[Shot of Maggie’s hand scraping the inside of the shells with the knife, then tilting the shell.]

We’ll do the same for the shell here. I remove the first water, because the oyster will naturally make a second water when we empty the first.

[Shot of Maggie and a man.]

So, its reflex will be to always stay in its water. So, it will expel some water.

[Shot of a hand removing impurities from the shell with the knife, then of the knife moving the oyster muscle.]

You don’t have to do this, but it helps to remove any loose shell fragments that may be left inside. We make sure the oyster glides smoothly. It’s ready to eat.

[Shot of Maggie talking and taking an oyster and turning it in her hands and of the hollow part below.]

All oysters, when they’re packed, will be placed this way and not like that. Because that way, the oyster would tend to leak, lose its juice and then die. But when they’re placed like this, they keep their juice because of the hollow part of the oyster.

[Shot of Maggie talking.]

If stored in a cool place, an oyster’s shelf life is about 1 month. So when we sell them, we always tell people to look at the harvest date. Then calculate 1 month after that date to eat them.

[Shot of an open oyster and a few closed ones to the side.]

Yep! Just put them in the fridge.

[Exploramer logo.]

This recipe goes well with a Sancerre, Muscadet Sèvre et Maine or Chenin Blanc (South Africa) wine.

To help you eat shellfish safely, you can find advice on storage, handling and cooking on the recipe sheet dedicated to precautionary measures for shellfish.

This project was made possible through funding from Digital Museums Canada and the participation and collaboration of Université Laval.