Charbroiled Oysters a La New Orleans

• 4 dozen oysters
• 4 sticks butter
• 3 tbsp minced garlic
• 2 tbsp Symptom Sauce (or to taste)
• 1 tbsp Cajun seasoning (or to taste)
• 1 tbsp Worcestershire
• 1 tsp black pepper
• 1 cup Parm
• 1 cup Percorino
• Minced parsley to garnish

Notes: Choose large oysters, because they will shrink when cooking. I prefer Gulf Coast oysters but any large oyster will do. Northern Atlantic and Pacific oysters are absolutely delicious, but tend to be small. Eat them raw with a splash of Shinedown Symptom Sauce, instead of cooking them.

What if you have a propane grill or just an oven,? No problem, but we need to adjust a bit of the technique. You don’t want to pour butter over your propane grill or oven and then have to clean that up. What a mess that would be! Your solution is to create a compound butter. Mix sauce ingredients together with room temperature butter, cheeses, and refrigerate. Spoon the slightly solidified sauce by the teaspoon over each oyster to avoid spillovers. To use in the oven, place the oysters on a sheet pan, add solidified sauce to each, and then broil on high till bubbly

1. Light a fire. I prefer to cook oysters over an open flame like a wood fire or charcoal grill. (Please see the notes for variations using different cooking appliances.)
2. For the sauce, add the butter, garlic, hot sauce, seasonings, and Worcestershire into a sauce pot and melt gently over the heat of your grill. Mix occasionally and don’t let it burn. Remove the pot from heat when necessary. Keep it in liquid form.
3. Shuck your oysters and keep them cold until ready to grill. I prefer cooking a dozen or two at a time. If you don’t know how to shuck an oyster, there are great tutorials that you can find on the internet. Use proper tools, techniques and most importantly, don’t put the oyster knife into your hand or you will unfortunately be in the ER.
4. Place the shells on the grate of your grill over hot coals and allow to cook for 2-3 minutes. Now it is time to sauce! My preferred method is to use a small ladle and pour approximately 1 tbsp of sauce over each oyster, allowing some of the sauce to spill into the fire and flare up. It is the flare up that chars the oysters and gives them the proper flavor. Please be careful not to burn yourself as the flames shoot up. You’re going to break a sweat. As the saying goes ‘no pain, no gain’. Once you are sauced up and the flames have died back, sprinkle generously with both cheeses. Grill until the liquid in the shells starts to bubble and boil-that’s it! You’re done! Use tongs to pull the oysters off the grill. Sprinkle with parsley and serve with crusty French bread, saltines, lemon wedges, and more Shinedown Symptom Sauce on the side. My personal preference is straight out of the shell, onto a saltine, and dressed with Shinedown Symptom Sauce. Dig in my friends!