Love and Life One Half-shell at a Time

My love for oysters is legend. In The Big O, I wrote about my first shucking lesson. One of the great joys of my life has been watching my "little sister" Jesse turn into an inspiring young woman. Turns out to be a damn good shucker, too.

We've seen a profusion of oyster bars and offerings in Boston of late and to that I say "bout time!" Boston Oyster Bars noted in this Boston Globe article include Neptune Oyster and B&G. There are far more venues offering a greater variety than used to be the case.

The article includes an interview with Rowan Jacobsen author of an important new book: "A Geography of Oysters: The Connoisseur's Guide to Oyster Eating in North America," (Bloomsbury USA). This link will take you to Jacobsen's terrific website (careful if you're hungry and it's too late to go grab some oysters!)

Good news for all of us: sustainability of the oyster.
Oysters are filter feeders, they actually clean the water they're growing in. Oyster farms actually improve their surrounds unlike some aquaculture which can harm their environment by adding waste and antibiotics to the water.

In The Big Oyster, Author Mark Kurlansky traces the history of our love affair with the oyster. The book is an homage to the mollusk and a fascinating history of New York City as intertwined as it is with these tasty little guys. They weren't always little, of course. They used to be harvested so late and so large that one writer complained that eating a foot-long oyster was rather like eating a baby. Baby-eating aside, Kurlansky's book is a gem. One might say a pearl. No really. If history classes were this interesting I wouldn't have cut them so often!

Stay tuned for the roundup of the "Teach a Man to Fish" blog event.

Sustainable seafood recipes, links to info from the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch program and participants' websites and blogs will be included.

It's a Wrap - click here to see the results!