This morning I picked up 1 dozen of Salt Pond and 1 dozen of East Beach Blondes oysters for this evening. Since the stores are absolutely mobbed and the fish store, also crazy mobbed, did not have shallots is there another vinegar based recipe that’s a good marriage to these oysters? I do have a homemade cocktail type sauce and lemons to go with but I know some would like a vinaigrette. Any mild herb with vinegar choices? I do have several types of vinegar on hand…Thank you & Happy Holidays, Gary
Search for Mignonette sauce, you should find plenty out there.
Generous squeeze of lemon and a few drops of crystal hot sauce - heaven!
Aren’t shallots the basis of mignonette? I got the impression that that’s what OP wanted to make but can’t.
It’s not hard to substitute onion & a bit of garlic for shallot.
Here is “Mike’s WIcked Mignonette”, recipe from a German friend of ours. This was a big hit at an oyster display in Maine last year:
Michael made a vinaigrette sauce which we liked a lot, and it’s way
less fussy than the mignonette.
Just finely chopped red onion and vinegar. He used cider vinegar because that’s what he had, but he said almost any type will work, and he prefers rice vinegar. You could also use sweet onion or shallots, I’m sure, and chop them in a food processor. It was maybe 1 part onion to 2 or 3 parts vinegar.
add some tarragon to the mignonette.
Took Mel’s advice and used a little yellow onion and dried garlic in champagne vinegar. Worked well for those folks who wanted a mignonette. Shucking went faster than expected. A nice Triolet brut NV washed them down beautifully. Will do another 3 dozen on NYE.
I use shallots and champagne wine vinegar - a little salt and pepper to taste - a splash of fresh lemon juice.
I shall be getting shallots for mignonette along with plain lemon and a cocktail sauce to go with 3 dz (total) from 3 different local oyster farms for NYE. My spouse thinks we need to pull out a 1990 Dom Perignon for the occassion. I’m not so sure yet…Gary
I like champagne vinegar for mignonette as well. Freezing it to ice and then shaving it onto the oysters can be kind of a cool effect, if you like that sort of thing.