Oyster Stuffing Cakes

When you get your hands on ice-cold oysters straight from the Chesapeake Bay, it would be foolish to do anything beyond shuck and slurp. But in the 19th century, oysters were so plentiful in eastern Virginia and Maryland that they burrowed their way into the region's cooking traditions. Most were smoked and salted, roasted over fire, dropped into chowders and stews and used in stuffings. The chef Peter Woods at Merroir in Topping, Va., serves this crisp, savory treat in fall and winter as an appetizer, or as a main course with a big winter salad of bitter greens, pears or dried fruit and toasted nuts.

Try to buy the oysters for this recipe at a fish store with high turnover and have the counterman shuck them for you; if you can't, even packaged shucked oysters will do fine. They are chopped up small in this recipe so they melt into the bread and herbs, and their briny liquor binds the mixture. You taste umami and butter and salt, but nothing screams "Oyster!" —Julia Moskin