Email
Print
Oyster stew for breakfast?
ADVERTISEMENT
Published: January 12, 2010
Different families have different Christmas traditions. Some families exchange and open gifts on Christmas Eve, some do this on Christmas morning. Some families go to a midnight church service on Christmas Eve, while others do not.
A family I know goes bowling all night on New Year's Eve.
For many of us, special foods are an integral part of the season as well. The holidays (originally "holy days") are the ideal time to prepare and share the dishes that were handed down through your family.
My father, O. C. Stonestreet Jr., got the idea for oyster stew for Christmas morning breakfast from the Caldwells, whose house was on North Main in Mooresville. Their backyard bordered ours on West Park Avenue. Paul and Virginia Caldwell had two children, a cute dark-haired girl named Leda, who was in the grade above me, and a fair-haired brother, Eric, who I think was in the grade below me at Park View Elementary School. Eric and I were friends.
I have no idea how this oyster-stew-for-breakfast idea came up. We ate oyster stew for supper in the winter, so the dish was not unknown to us. The novelty was the idea of eating something like that for breakfast.
Evidently it had been a Caldwell family tradition to have oyster stew on Christmas morning for some time, and my father and mother decided, one Christmas, that this would make a good Stonestreet tradition, too, and so it has been for at least 50 years.
The Caldwells moved to Newton about the time I was in the 4th or 5th grade, and despite assurances from my mother that we might drive over and visit them some time, that was the last I ever saw of the Caldwell family. I assume they continued eating oyster stew on Christmas mornings after they moved to Newton.
To go with the oyster stew, Mom prepared a fruit mixture that she called "ambrosia." Ambrosia, you may recall, was the food of the Olympian gods in Greek mythology, and if the gods ate ambrosia like my mom fixed it they were a jovial lot indeed.
I can see Mom in my mind's eye working at the kitchen sink slicing orange sections with a knife.
Added to the oranges were grapefruit, pineapple, cut-up banana, shredded coconut and maraschino cherry halves and a little sugar.
Delicious!
This year the family gathered at my house for dinner on Christmas day. My wife, Judy, doesn't recognize oysters as food, so I waited for my brother and my son to arrive before I fixed the stew.
The three of us enjoyed the stew and thought about Christmases past. Mom and Dad are both gone now, but a part of them was in the kitchen with us Christmas day.
I don't care what your tradition is, but you should continue some Christmas or holiday traditions of your own. If you have none, it's not too late to start. Call up one of you aunts and see if she has grandma's recipe for sugar cookies or gingerbread or whatever. Then teach your children to make it. Better yet, supervise them as THEY make it.
Years from now, they and their families may be gathered around a Christmas table about to enjoy that special dish, and they will remember you.
Here's the way I make oyster stew. Feel free to alter it to your liking. It also goes down well on New Years' morning.
Oyster Stew
1 pint of small oysters (reserve juice)
1 12 oz. can of evaporated milk (or half-and-half)
1 pint milk
1/2 stick butter (or margarine)
dash of Worcestershire sauce
dash of hot pepper sauce (Texas Pete or Tabasco)
dash of ground nutmeg
salt and pepper to taste
oyster crackers
Pour raw oysters and juice into a bowl and with you fingers feel them to make sure there are no bits of shell or small pearls in with the oysters. Drain the juice and save it.
In a quart saucepan melt the butter add the oysters and saute until they begin to curl. Add the reserved juice, a couple of shots of Worcestershire and hot sauce, then add a good sprinkle of nutmeg, and salt and pepper to taste. Keep stirring and bring heat up just until it begins to boil.
Remove from heat just as it boils. Be careful or it will boil over and you will have to clean the stove top.
Serves four.
Email
Print
ADVERTISEMENT
Advertisement
