July 27, 2026

Seafood platter at home

A cold platter is mostly buying and arranging, with very little cooking. The skill is balancing texture across the plate: sweet white crab meat, firm cooked prawns, soft oysters, meaty lobster or crab claws and briny cockles or whelks. Give us a day's notice and we prepare the lot, so all you do is set it out on ice.

Serves 4Prep 40 minCook 0 min (components come cooked, oysters are shucked raw)Total 40 min Order the crab

Ingredients

  • 1 whole cooked brown crab, dressed (we pick and dress it)
  • 1 cooked lobster, halved (we cook, split and clean it), optional centrepiece
  • 8 to 12 cooked king prawns, shell on
  • 12 live rock oysters (we shuck them to order)
  • 200g cooked cockles or whelks
  • 6 to 8 cooked langoustines (optional)
  • crushed ice and lemon wedges
  • brown bread and butter
  • mayonnaise, Marie Rose and mignonette to serve

Method

  1. Chill everything first. A cold platter must be properly cold. Fill a large tray or a tiered stand with crushed ice.
  2. Set the centrepiece down first, either the dressed crab in its shell or the lobster halves cut side up, in the middle.
  3. Arrange the prawns and langoustines around it with the tails curling outward.
  4. Sit the shucked oysters into the ice cupped side down so they hold their liquor. Put the cockles or whelks in a small bowl.
  5. Tuck lemon wedges and a little parsley into the gaps. Set the sauces and brown bread alongside.
  6. Serve straight away while everything is cold, with finger bowls and picks. Discard any oyster that had gaped and failed to close before shucking.

To serve: Crusty bread, thin brown bread and butter and a green salad. To drink, a chilled Muscadet or Chablis, an English sparkling or a cold lager. Tell us how many people and we scale it. As a rough guide, allow 150 to 200g of mixed shellfish per person as a main, or half that as a starter.

Shop this recipe: oysters, king prawns and the boxes. Cut to order at the counter.