Plump oysters with curled edges, dusted with paprika, in a pale butter broth with bits of celery over slices of toast in a shallow white bowl, with a lemon half beside it. — Oysters in butter broth with celery and paprika, over hot toast.

Chafing-Dish Oysters (1896)

Name: Chafing Dish Oysters
Prep time: 10 min
Cook time: 10 min
Total time: 20 min
Cuisine: American
Ingredients: 1 pint shucked oysters, with their liquor; ¼ cup unsalted butter; ¼ tsp salt; ⅛ tsp ground black pepper; ½ tsp sweet paprika; 1 dash Tabasco sauce; 1 tbsp finely sliced celery; 2 tsp lemon juice; 1 tbsp dry sherry; 4 slices white bread; 1 cup heavy cream, optional

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Chafing-dish oysters à la George Trimble Davidson, 1896: oysters warmed in butter and their liquor with celery, paprika, Tabasco, lemon and sherry, poured over hot toast.

By The Forgotten MenuPublished Oct 29, 2026

Recipe makes: 4 servings
Prep: 10 min
Cook: 10 min
Total: 20 min

Make the toast and slice the celery first; the oysters cook for about 4 minutes once they are in the pan.

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Oysters in butter broth with celery and paprika, over hot toast.

The story behind the recipe

Oysters get a shrug on the list of chafing-dish spreads in May E. Southworth’s Midnight Feasts (1914): “Oysters (in any way),” followed by a salad and buttered crackers. Deshler Welch had already offered plenty of ways in The Bachelor and the Chafing Dish (New York, 1896), and this is one of the quickest: oysters warmed in butter and their own liquor, sharpened with celery, Tabasco, lemon and sherry, and poured over hot toast.

Who was George Trimble Davidson?

Welch heads the recipe Oysters à la George Trimble Davidson and says nothing more about him. Most of the book’s hundred-odd chafing-dish recipes came, its contents page says, from contributors, and several carry a man’s name in the same way. Davidson’s name turns up again a few pages on, over broiled sardines covered with melted cheese. The book never explains who he was; the name on the heading is the only record it keeps.

About four minutes

Welch’s oyster pages agree on one point. His plain stewed oysters simmer “very gently,” and he warns against letting them boil, “or the oyster will become hard.” The Davidson oysters cook for about four minutes, and Welch adds that a pint of rich cream stirred into the broth makes the dish richer, “though it is not absolutely necessary.”

Making it today

We halve Welch’s quart of oysters to a pint, which serves four on toast, and halve everything with them. His “butter the size of two eggs” becomes a quarter cup, after the old rule printed in Elizabeth O. Hiller’s Fifty-Two Sunday Dinners (1913), which counts butter the size of an egg as two ounces, a quarter of a cup. The heat is gentle, and the oysters cook until their edges curl and they reach 145°F (63°C), the temperature the FDA gives for most seafood; that takes about Welch’s four minutes. The optional cream is his, halved too.

Welch’s bachelors and Southworth’s college crowd share What Did a Chafing-Dish Supper Serve?. Southworth paired her own oysters with a celery salad; from her list, the Cosmos Club Shrimps (1914) make the next spread.

Butter the size of two eggs melted first in the dish, then pour in a quart of oysters and as much of the broth as desirable, flavor with salt and pepper, a teaspoonful of paprika, and a dash of tabasco. ...

Deshler WelchThe Bachelor and the Chafing Dish (New York and Chicago: F. Tennyson Neely, 1896), Oysters à la George Trimble Davidson, p. 100

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Ingredients

For 4 servings. Quantities are shown as written.

Quantities as written here, for 4 servings.

Shucked oysters, with their liquor1 pint
Unsalted butter1/4 cup
Salt1/4 tsp
Ground black pepper1/8 tsp
Sweet paprika1/2 tsp
Tabasco sauce1 dash
Finely sliced celery1 tbsp
Lemon juice2 tsp
Dry sherry1 tbsp
White bread4 slices
Heavy cream, optional1 cup

Ingredients as written here

1 pint shucked oysters, with their liquor
¼ cup unsalted butter
¼ tsp salt
⅛ tsp ground black pepper
½ tsp sweet paprika
1 dash Tabasco sauce
1 tbsp finely sliced celery
2 tsp lemon juice
1 tbsp dry sherry
4 slices white bread
1 cup heavy cream, optional

Equipment

10-inch skillet or wide saucepan
Instant-read thermometer
Toaster

Instructions

Toast the white bread, and keep the slices warm in shallow bowls or on warm plates.
Melt the unsalted butter in the skillet over medium-low heat.
Tip in the shucked oysters with as much of their liquor as you like, and season with the salt, ground black pepper, sweet paprika and Tabasco sauce. If using the heavy cream, pour it in now.
Add the finely sliced celery, lemon juice and dry sherry. Keep the pan at a gentle simmer, without letting it boil hard, and cook for about 4 minutes (5 or 6 with the cream), stirring gently now and then, until the oysters are plump, their edges have curled and they read 145°F (63°C) in the thickest one.
Spoon the oysters and their broth over the hot toast and serve at once.

Nutrition

250calories per serving

Recipe makes: 4 servings
Servings: 4

Estimated per serving (4) from USDA FoodData Central values for raw eastern oysters, butter, white bread toast and dry sherry, without the optional cream.

Recipe notes

When adjusting quantities

Half of Welch’s quart of oysters. For his full quart, use a wide pan so the oysters sit almost in one layer and cook evenly.

Notes

Quantities mentioned in these notes don’t change when you adjust the servings.

Welch gives a quart of oysters; we scaled it to a pint, four slices of toast and four servings, and halved every other amount of his. His dash of Tabasco stays a dash, and “the juice of half a lemon” becomes two teaspoons. Oysters are a common shellfish allergen, and people who are pregnant, older or have weakened immunity should not eat them undercooked. Eat them straight from the pan; don’t keep or reheat leftovers.

Scaling changes the ingredients only; pan sizes and cooking times need their own judgment. To adapt this recipe further, try the recipe tool at TuneMyRecipe (opens in a new tab), our sister site.