Charbroil Buttery, Garlic Oysters Over Your Coal Chimney

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Oysters are like grapes: the best of the harsh families. Grapes from warm, comfortable climates are thick and happy, but watery and mushy, and I found the same could be said for everyone’s favorite slippery bivalve. The first oysters I tasted from Mississippi were huge ones from the fragrant Gulf of Mexico. I didn’t care about them raw, but then I grilled them on charcoal.

Charcoal grilled oyster, most famously made by Drago’s in New Orleans (and Jackson, Mississippi), is one of my favorite snacks around the world. My dad calls them “the best thing he’s ever eaten” and insists we drink them with a fresh cold glass of chardonnay because he’s wise. A mixture of butter, garlic and cheese is spooned over freshly peeled oysters, which then explode to hell on a hot charcoal grill. The salty liquid comes out of the oyster and is mixed with melted butter and then boiled down quickly to form a concentrated umami sauce enhanced with garlic and a bit of cheese. The oyster itself benefits from water loss, making it more meaty and flavorful.

These oysters are over the top but not overly difficult to cook as long as you bring the fire. The burst of heat is key, and it’s hard to replicate at home. While a standard Weber kettle can get quite hot , it takes a large amount of charcoal to fill even half of the grill’s surface area with intense enough heat to properly seam bivalve clams. Instead of blowing out a week’s supply of charcoal in one meal, you can use a charcoal chimney to create a real fire tunnel.

Get a hot grill with these tools:

Using a charcoal chimney, as you probably know, is the easiest way to heat up a pile of charcoal. Fill it with coals and place a lighter under it, and in 20-30 minutes you will have a luminous tube sprayed on coal. Usually these coals are poured onto a charcoal grate – sometimes with additional coals – and roasted as usual, but leave the coals in the chimney and you can use the concentrated heat flow coming from the metal pipe. (Butcher Goldwyn uses his chimney to brown steaks well , which led me to try it with oysters.)

According to Meathead, the bluish, almost colorless heat escaping from a chimney can reach up to 800℉ (he tested it with an infrared thermometer), much hotter than the temperature you normally get in a simple coal-fired unit, and closer. those who work in a professional kitchen. Excess heat chars the oysters, cooking them quickly, giving them a smoky, deep brown flavor without hiding their salty, oceanic quality.

How to set up a chimney for roasting oysters

You need to reconfigure things a bit, but it’s not a big deal. Remove the grill grate from the charcoal grill. Take the chimney and fill it with charcoal, then light the fuel cube on the charcoal grate and place the chimney over it. Let the chimney do its thing until the top coals crumble and catch fire. Install a grill grate on top of the chimney. You can also use a trellis, but make sure it’s uncoated and made of a strong material that doesn’t warp. (The rack will work for a few quick vegetables , but oysters take a little longer.)

Now you are ready for the oysters.

How to Prepare Oysters for the Grill

Buy your oysters in the afternoon and keep them on ice in the fridge until you’re ready to throw them on the grill. Most seafood stalls pack oysters in ice when you buy them, but keep an eye on it and refill if it melts.

My nearest grocery store sells pre-peeled oysters, but if yours doesn’t, you’ll have to scrub them . When doing this, make sure the oyster is attached to the more concave side of the shell, otherwise it could slip into the fire pits of your chimney. (I confused it with the oyster in the center of the back row and I had to give it to my boyfriend to eat. He wasn’t angry.)

Make garlic butter

You don’t have to go Drago’s route, but I strongly recommend that you do. The combination of butter, garlic and seafood is classic for a reason and widely available for easy searching. The Spruce Eats already posted a Drago-approved recipe , so I used it. The only edit I would make would be to keep the peppers fresh until after frying, as the flavor is largely worn off when cooked at high heat.

To make butter, finely – I mean finely – chop six cloves of garlic. Large chunks won’t soften on the grill, so cut them into chunks and heat gently in a small pot of melted butter on the stove to soften the harshness. Or, if you like the aggressive spiciness of fresh garlic, coarsen the minced meat, then add the garlic to the freshly melted butter and go. (My garlic cloves were a bit thick for my taste, but my Italian boyfriend thought they were perfect. Do whatever you want with it.)

Get a grill

This recipe is a little dangerous. Not only does the chimney reach almost 800 degrees, the oil will drip and flare (okay), and the oysters (which are full of water) can burst and splatter. Once your oyster is on the grill and drenched in oil, stand back and stay away for a few minutes until the action subsides and try to keep the area free of children and pets.

Oysters are ready when their shells are heavily charred around the edges, the body of the oyster is swollen in the center, and the edges of the oyster are curled up. This takes three to five minutes.

When they’re done, (carefully) remove them from the grill and add some more oil and a few pinches of cheese. Drago’s recommends a mixture of parmesan and pecorino, so this is what I used and what I recommend. Add also a pinch of parsley; leafy greens are important. Serve with bread to soak up excess oyster oil; it’s even more important than leafy greens.

fried oysters

Ingredients:

  • 1 stick (1/2 cup salted butter)
  • 6 garlic cloves, finely minced
  • 2 pinches dried oregano
  • 12 oysters, freshly caught
  • 1 ounce grated Parmesan
  • 1 ounce grated pecorino
  • Fresh pepper
  • 1 tablespoon chopped parsley

Remove the grate from the grill. Fill the chimney with charcoal and place it over the lit fuel cube on the charcoal grate. Let the chimney run for about half an hour until the coals are white hot.

Meanwhile, melt the butter over the stove over medium-low heat, then add the garlic and let it soften but not brown as the charcoal heats up. This is also a good time to make sure your oysters are clean and ready to eat. Mix the two cheeses together and set them aside.

Once the coals are ready, place a grill grate (or mini grill grate) over the chimney and place 2-4 oysters on the coals. Put a spoonful of oil on the oysters and be generous with it, you want the oil to flare up to help create that charcoal-roasted flavor. Cook for 3-5 minutes, until the centers of the oysters have risen and the edges are curled. Remove them carefully with tongs, top with a little more butter, then immediately top with a few generous pinches of the cheese mixture. Season with fresh pepper and garnish with chopped parsley, then repeat until you run out of oysters.

Serve with buttered bread and a few lemon wedges and a bottle of Louisiana hot sauce if you like. Wash it down with a crunchy chardonnay if you want to enjoy the full taste of Drago, approved by Claire’s father.

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