OYSTER SALAD
Breakfast, Luncheon and Tea
By Marion Harland [Mary Virginia Terhune] (1875)
OYSTER SALAD.
• 1 quart oysters, cut-not chopped-into small pieces.
• 1 bunch celery, cut-not chopped-into small pieces.
• 2 hard-boiled eggs.
• 2 raw eggs, well whipped.
• 1 great spoonful salad oil.
• 1 teaspoonful powdered sugar.
• 1 small spoonful salt.
• 1 small spoonful pepper.
• 1 small spoonful made mustard.
• Half cup best cider vinegar.
Drain the liquor well from the oysters and cut them with a sharp knife into dice.
Cut the celery, which should be white and crisp, into pieces of corresponding size.
Set them aside in separate vessels, in a cold place while you prepare the dressing.
Beat the eggs light (with a "Dover" egg-beater, if you have one), mix in the sugar; then whip in gradually the oil until it is a light cream.
Have ready, rubbed to a powder, the boiled yolks; add to them the salt, pepper, and lastly the mustard.
Beat these into the oil and yolk, and then, two or three drops at a time, the vinegar, whipping the dressing briskly, but lightly for two or three minutes.
It should, if properly managed, be like rich yellow cream-or custard.
With a silver fork toss up the oysters and celery to gether in a glass dish; pour half of the dressing over them; toss up-not stir it down-for a minute, and pour the rest on the top.
Lay a border of light-green celery tufts close within the edge of the bowl, with a cluster in the middle of the salad.
Serve as soon as may be, after it is mixed. Meanwhile, keep on the ice.
The complete 'Breakfast, Luncheon and Tea' may be found on the Michigan State University website:
'Feeding America: The Historic American Cookbook Project'
http://digital.lib.msu.edu/projects/cookbooks/
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