Oysters Tsarina

There was a time not too long ago, as you know, when I enjoyed oysters and champagne almost every evening. A couple of bottles of Veuve Clicquot and two dozen raw oysters on the half-shell with bank colleagues after work. It is only recently that I revived the practice, though on a slightly different scale. I read an interview with Barry Humphries in the FT over the weekend in which he mentions a dish called Oysters Tsarina (excerpt below). I am unfamiliar with it, but it sounds très delish. If you have the precise recipe, please do pass it along.

'He talks about an interview he did many years ago with a newspaper at the Savoy Hotel. “I could order whatever I wanted. So I ordered Oysters Tsarina. Oysters that you dip in sour cream, chopped onions and caviar. You slurp those down. And the chef came out, quite an elderly man, and he said, “I just wanted to say you’re the first person to have ordered Oysters Tsarina since von Ribbentrop.” He beams at this outrageous association with the Nazi foreign minister. Humphries is a connoisseur of provocation.'

'Lunch with the FT: Barry Humphries', Financial Times, 9 December 2011