Oyster sauce describes a number of sauces made by cooking

oyster Oyster is the common name for a number of different families of salt-water bivalve molluscs that live in marine or brackish habitats. In some species, the valves are highly calcified, and many are somewhat irregular in shape. Many, but not al ...

s. The most common in modern use is a

viscous The viscosity of a fluid is a measure of its resistance to deformation at a given rate. For liquids, it corresponds to the informal concept of "thickness": for example, syrup has a higher viscosity than water. Viscosity quantifies the inter ...

dark brown

condiment A condiment is a preparation that is added to food, typically after cooking, to impart a specific Flavoring, flavor, to enhance the flavor, or to complement the dish. A table condiment or table sauce is more specifically a condiment that is serv ...

made from

extracts,The Times, 22 January 1981; ''Cook Accidentally on purpose'' sugar, salt and water thickened with

corn starch Corn starch, maize starch, or cornflour (British English) is the starch derived from corn (maize) grain. The starch is obtained from the endosperm of the kernel. Corn starch is a common food ingredient, often used to thicken sauces or sou ...

. Some versions may be darkened with

caramel Caramel ( or ) is an orange-brown confectionery product made by heating a range of sugars. It can be used as a flavoring in puddings and desserts, as a filling in bonbons, or as a topping for ice cream and custard. The process of caramelizatio ...

, though high-quality oyster sauce is naturally dark.BigOven Food Dictionary
Oyster sauce
' It is commonly used in

Chinese Chinese can refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation ** List of ethnic groups in China, people of ...

Thai Thai or THAI may refer to: * Of or from Thailand, a country in Southeast Asia ** Thai people, the dominant ethnic group of Thailand ** Thai language, a Tai-Kadai language spoken mainly in and around Thailand *** Thai script *** Thai (Unicode block ...

Malay Malay may refer to: Languages * Malay language or Bahasa Melayu, a major Austronesian language spoken in Indonesia, Malaysia, Brunei and Singapore ** History of the Malay language, the Malay language from the 4th to the 14th century ** Indonesi ...

Vietnamese Vietnamese may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Vietnam, a country in Southeast Asia ** A citizen of Vietnam. See Demographics of Vietnam. * Vietnamese people, or Kinh people, a Southeast Asian ethnic group native to Vietnam ** Overse ...

, and

Khmer cuisine Cambodian cuisine is an umbrella term for the cuisines of all ethnic groups in Cambodia, whereas Khmer cuisine ( km, សិល្បៈធ្វើម្ហូបខ្មែរ; ) refers specifically to the more than thousand years old culina ...

Production

Oyster sauce production began in China no later than the mid-1870s. Oysters were boiled in three iron basins for half an hour then removed for drying on rattan either by sun or over a moderate fire. The water from the basins was reduced in a fourth basin to "a blackish sauce". Sea-water, salt and/or soy could be added. Today, many shortcuts have been made to create a similar flavor more quickly and at reduced cost. Oyster sauces today are usually made with a base of sugar and salt and thickened with corn starch. Oyster extracts or essences are then used to give flavor to the base sauce. Other ingredients, such as soy sauce and

monosodium glutamate Monosodium glutamate (MSG), also known as sodium glutamate, is the sodium salt of glutamic acid. MSG is found naturally in some foods including tomatoes and cheese in this glutamic acid form. MSG is used in cooking as a flavor enhancer wi ...

, may also be added to deepen the flavor and add color. The quality of the oyster sauce will greatly affect the flavor. Oyster sauce is made manually in the traditional method. Some oyster sauce manufacturers have improved the process to mass-produce oyster sauce with

automation Automation describes a wide range of technologies that reduce human intervention in processes, namely by predetermining decision criteria, subprocess relationships, and related actions, as well as embodying those predeterminations in machines ...

. The oyster extracts are mixed with

sugar Sugar is the generic name for sweet-tasting, soluble carbohydrates, many of which are used in food. Simple sugars, also called monosaccharides, include glucose, fructose, and galactose. Compound sugars, also called disaccharides or double ...

, and the like, with the weighing and mixing processes powered by an automatic electronic system before uniform blending on the automatic

production line A production line is a set of sequential operations established in a factory where components are assembled to make a finished article or where materials are put through a refining process to produce an end-product that is suitable for onward c ...

. The mixed ingredients are cooked in a sealed automatic production system at high temperature by a computerized system. The cooked sauce is transferred to the filling system through sealed pipelines, and reaches the market shelves only after multiple rounds of inspection.

Culinary use

Oyster sauce adds a savory flavor to many meat and vegetable dishes. The sauce is a staple for much Chinese family-style cooking. It is commonly used in noodle stir-fries, such as chow mein. It is also found in popular Chinese-American dishes such as beef with stir-fried vegetables. Oyster sauce can also be used as a topping for some dishes. Since its early stage of development, oyster sauce has been widely popular with

Cantonese Cantonese ( zh, t=廣東話, s=广东话, first=t, cy=Gwóngdūng wá) is a language within the Chinese (Sinitic) branch of the Sino-Tibetan languages originating from the city of Guangzhou (historically known as Canton) and its surrounding are ...

chefs as a traditional

umami Umami ( from ja, 旨味 ), or savoriness, is one of the five basic tastes. It has been described as savory and is characteristic of broths and cooked meats. People taste umami through taste receptors that typically respond to glutamates and ...

rich condiment. Applications are no longer restricted to Cantonese cuisine. Be it the well-balanced Shandong cuisine, the spicy hot

Sichuanese cuisine Sichuan cuisine, alternatively romanized as Szechwan cuisine or Szechuan cuisine (, Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ), is a style of Chinese cuisine originating from Sichuan Province. It has bold flavours, particularly the pungency and spicin ...

, or the

seafood Seafood is any form of sea life regarded as food by humans, prominently including fish and shellfish. Shellfish include various species of molluscs (e.g. bivalve molluscs such as clams, oysters and mussels, and cephalopods such as octopus an ...

and red stewing-dominated

Jiangsu Jiangsu (; ; pinyin: Jiāngsū, Postal romanization, alternatively romanized as Kiangsu or Chiangsu) is an Eastern China, eastern coastal Provinces of the People's Republic of China, province of the China, People's Republic of China. It is o ...

and Zhejiang cuisine, oyster sauce enhances flavor. It brings out the

flavor. Dishes that may use oyster sauce include

Crab in oyster sauce , country = China & Indonesia , region = East Asia and Southeast Asia notably: Indonesia, Philippines, Singapore , creator = Chinese cuisine , course = Main course , served = Hot , main_in ...

Kai-lan Gai lan, kai-lan, Chinese broccoli, Chinese kale, or jie lan (''Brassica oleracea'' var. ''alboglabra'') is a leaf vegetable with thick, flat, glossy blue-green leaves with thick stems, and florets similar to (but much smaller than) broccoli. ...

Buddha's delight Buddha's delight, often transliterated as ''Luóhàn zhāi'', ''lo han jai'', or ''lo hon jai'', is a vegetarian dish well known in Chinese and Buddhist cuisine. It is sometimes also called ''Luóhàn cài'' (). The dish is traditionally enjo ...

Hainanese chicken rice Hainanese chicken rice is a dish of poached chicken and seasoned rice, served with chilli sauce and usually with cucumber garnishes. It was created by immigrants from Hainan in southern China and adapted from the Hainanese dish Wenchang chic ...

Cashew chicken Cashew chicken () is a Chinese-American dish that combines chicken (usually stir-fried but occasionally deep-fried, depending on the variation), with cashews and either a light brown garlic sauce or a thick sauce made from chicken stock, soy sa ...

Lo mein Lo mein () is a Chinese dish with egg noodles. It often contains vegetables and some type of meat or seafood, usually beef, chicken, pork, or shrimp. It might also be served with wontons (called ''húntun'' 餛飩/馄饨 in Mandarin) although w ...

Cha siu baau ''Char siu bao'' () is a Cantonese barbecue-pork-filled ''baozi'' (bun).Hsiung, Deh-Ta. Simonds, Nina. Lowe, Jason. 005 ''The Food of China: A Journey for Food Lovers''. Bay Books. . p. 24. The buns are filled with barbecue-flavored ''cha si ...

Har gow Har gow (sometimes anglicized as "ha gow", "haukau", "hakao"; ) is a traditional Cantonese dumpling served as dim sum.Hsiung, Deh-Ta. Simonds, Nina. Lowe, Jason. 005(2005). The food of China: a journey for food lovers. Bay Books. . p41. Name T ...

Kai yat sai Khai yat sai or kai yat sai ( th, ไข่ยัดไส้, , ) is a type of Thai omelette. The name means 'stuffed eggs'. The egg is cooked lightly, topped with various ingredients (such as minced beef or pork, peas, onion, spring onion, carr ...

Wonton noodles Wonton noodles (, also called wanton mee or wanton mein) is a noodle dish of Cantonese origin. Wonton noodles were given their name, ''húntún'' (), in the Tang Dynasty (618-907 CE). The dish is popular in Southern China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, ...

, and Daikon cake.

Difference from fish sauce

While oyster sauce and

fish sauce Fish sauce is a liquid condiment made from fish or krill that have been coated in salt and fermented for up to two years. It is used as a staple seasoning in East Asian cuisine and Southeast Asian cuisine, particularly Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos, P ...

are both briny and may have related histories, they are different products. Fish sauce is watery, clear, and salty, whereas oyster sauce is made by reducing oyster extracts and therefore sweeter with a hint of salt and not as strong an aroma as fish sauce.

Varieties

"True" oyster sauce of good quality should be made by condensing oyster extracts, the white broth produced by boiling oysters in water. This

opaque Opacity or opaque may refer to: * Impediments to (especially, visible) light: ** Opacities, absorption coefficients ** Opacity (optics), property or degree of blocking the transmission of light * Metaphors derived from literal optics: ** In lingu ...

broth, similar to the color of

clam juice Clam juice is a broth derived from steamed clams, which can be drunk on its own or used as an ingredient in various dishes and beverages. Preparation Clam juice is typically prepared from the liquid obtained from steamed clams. Clam juice may be ...

found in supermarkets, is then reduced until a desired

viscosity The viscosity of a fluid is a measure of its resistance to deformation at a given rate. For liquids, it corresponds to the informal concept of "thickness": for example, syrup has a higher viscosity than water. Viscosity quantifies the inte ...

has been reached and the liquid has

caramelized Caramelization is a process of browning of sugar used extensively in cooking for the resulting sweet nutty flavor and brown color. The brown colors are produced by three groups of polymers: caramelans (C24H36O18), caramelens (C36H50O25), and ca ...

to a brown color. No other additives, not even

salt Salt is a mineral composed primarily of sodium chloride (NaCl), a chemical compound belonging to the larger class of salts; salt in the form of a natural crystalline mineral is known as rock salt or halite. Salt is present in vast quantitie ...

, should be added to the sauce, since the oysters should provide all the savory flavor. However, this method is prohibitively expensive. Many modern oyster sauces are thickened with

cornstarch Corn starch, maize starch, or cornflour (British English) is the starch derived from corn (maize) grain. The starch is obtained from the endosperm of the kernel. Corn starch is a common food ingredient, often used to thicken sauces or so ...

, flavored with oyster essence or extract and darkened with

Vegetarian oyster sauce

Vegetarian oyster sauce prepared from

mushrooms A mushroom or toadstool is the fleshy, spore-bearing Sporocarp (fungi), fruiting body of a fungus, typically produced above ground, on soil, or on its food source. ''Toadstool'' generally denotes one poisonous to humans. The standard for the na ...

, often

oyster mushroom ''Pleurotus'' is a genus of gilled mushrooms which includes one of the most widely eaten mushrooms, '' P. ostreatus''. Species of ''Pleurotus'' may be called oyster, abalone, or tree mushrooms, and are some of the most commonly cultivated edib ...

s or

shiitake The shiitake (alternate form shitake) (; ''Lentinula edodes'') is an edible mushroom native to East Asia, which is now cultivated and consumed around the globe. It is considered a Medicinal fungi, medicinal mushroom in some forms of tradition ...

mushrooms, is also popular and generally lower in price. It may contain more taste enhancers if less mushroom extract is used to reduce costs.

Non-MSG oyster sauce

Most of the oyster sauces available on the market contain added

(MSG). In recent years MSG-free varieties can also be found.

European oyster sauce

In 19th century French and English cooking, "oyster sauce" referred to a variant of

sauce blanche In cooking, a sauce is a liquid, cream, or semi-solid food, served on or used in preparing other foods. Most sauces are not normally consumed by themselves; they add flavor, moisture, and visual appeal to a dish. ''Sauce'' is a French languag ...

flavored with oysters, using a base of milk and melted butter rather than purely reducing the oysters by cooking.Mrs Beeton's Household Management
recipe 492 "Oyster Sauce", p. 224 (1861).Ude, Louis Eustache
The French Cook
p.293, Publisher Carey, Lea & Carey, 1829. The white sauce version was moistened with cream, whereas in brown oyster sauce, the cream was replaced with gravy. Common recipes using the sauce included "Steak and oyster sauce", documented as early as 1806, and "Cod and oyster sauce". This sauce was still being eaten in Australia in the 1970s.

Health

In 2001, the United Kingdom

Food Standards Agency , type = Non-ministerial government department , nativename = , nativename_a = , nativename_r = , logo = Food Standards Agency.svg , logo_width = , logo_caption = , seal = , seal_width = , seal_caption = , picture = , picture_width = ...

found in tests of various oyster sauces and

soy sauce Soy sauce (also called simply soy in American English and soya sauce in British English) is a liquid condiment of Chinese origin, traditionally made from a fermented paste of soybeans, roasted grain, brine, and '' Aspergillus oryzae'' or ''Asp ...

s that 22% of samples contained a chemical called 3-MCPD (3-monochloropropane-1,2-diol) at levels considerably higher than those deemed safe by the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been des ...

. About two thirds of these samples also contained a second chemical, called 1,3-DCP (1,3-dichloropropanol), which experts advise should not be present at any levels in food. Both chemicals have the potential to cause

cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...

, and the Agency recommended that the affected products be withdrawn from shelves and avoided. The joint Australia New Zealand Food Authority (ANZFA) said it had taken emergency action to amend its food standards code to set a limit for 3-MCPD in soy sauce of 0.02 milligrams per kilogram, in line with European Commission standards that came into force in the EU in April 2002.

References

External links

{{Condiments Chinese sauces Chinese condiments Philippine cuisine Thai cuisine Oyster dishes Umami enhancers