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The Art of Eating Oysters
The joys of discovering a renowned delicacy in the comfort of your home
If, for some reason, I found myself stranded on a tropical island with nothing more than a knife, a tent, a net, an iPod, a match, and nothing more than a lemon tree for shade, I would consider myself a lucky man. With survival as a legitimate excuse, I could finally indulge the rabid id of my palette — to eat nothing but oysters forever.
But since I’m no castaway, I instead visit Oyster Island almost every weekend. On Saturday mornings, I stop at the West Side Market in Cleveland, one of the last remaining big public market spaces in the U.S., and head straight toward Kate’s Fish stand. The vendors always begin to giggle as I approach. Once, I asked them why. “You’re one of the only guys that come here to get raw oysters to eat,” they said. “And you’re the youngest by forty years.”
Consider the oyster. Each one tells a story. Its flavor is imbued by type, region, season, currents, the surrounding minerals and nutrients — its “merroir,” in oyster jargon. Its taste and aftertaste constitute a satisfying beginning, middle, and end. As you tip the shell into your mouth, the seawater rushes in, setting the scene. Enter the viscera from stage left. The various flavors arrange into a sparkling kick-dance number. The show elegantly concludes with the aftertaste — a tangy or tart or sweet finish — leaving a pleasant buzz upon your palate. Standing ovation.
There’s a definite art to shucking an oyster. It requires confidence, practice, and a few flesh wounds that serve as dues.
Childhood is often colored by an interminable lust for things we cannot have: a candy bar, a new car, a crush. I loved oysters from the first time I tasted them, but growing up, I had, at best, no more than a few a year. Oysters were reserved for vacations to New York, and even then, my parents would order a dozen and split them four ways between my dad, my mom, me, and my sister. I understood my family’s reticence — a single oyster in a high-end restaurant can cost up to four dollars, meaning a dozen is kissing fifty.
