Oyster Options

Oh, Shucks! Raw or cooked, oysters make a special meal

Fresh oysters, available at some seafood retailers in San Diego, can be eaten raw with just a bit of lemon. It takes a bit of practice to open, or shuck, an oyster.

By CLYDE VAN ARSDALL IV

Tom Robbins, one of my favorite authors, once said, “Eating a raw oyster is like French-kissing a mermaid.” There was a beautiful mermaid on my mind this past summer when I returned to Rhode Island where I went to college. I was determined to get that kiss at Matunuck Oyster Company in South Kingston.

Matunuck Oyster Company is an oyster processing plant as well as a restaurant with a large waterfront patio. As I sat at the bar overlooking Potters Pond drinking Narragansett beer I got the kiss I had traveled so far to get. Each beer came with a shucked oyster on the half shell. Magical.

The oyster beds on Potters Pond provided the backdrop as I watched flatbed boats dump fresh oysters from the nearby beds on the pier connected to the restaurant just a stone’s throw away. It just doesn’t get any fresher than that. I was in oyster heaven.

I had ordered the Oyster Trio – grilled oysters topped with garlic butter, oysters broiled with a bourbon chipotle sauce and Rockefeller-style oysters – as an appetizer while waiting for a table. Lunch was a New Orleans-style fried oyster po’ boy sandwich, also known as an oyster loaf – my favorite way to eat oysters. My trip East reminded me of all the fun ways oysters can be served, and I couldn’t wait to make some of these amazing dishes at home. Coronado only offers a few places to get a raw oyster fix, and oysters are not readily available in most grocery stores, but these seafood markets sell live oysters: South Bay Fishery, Catalina Offshore Products and Point Loma Seafoods.

A po'boy sandwich comes with fried oysters and crusty bread. Lettuce and tomatoes are optional.

RECIPE | COURTESY OF CHEF CLYDE VAN ARSDALL IV Basic Mignonette Sauce

¼ cup red wine vinegar or Champagne vinegar 1 tablespoon minced shallot ¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper 12 large oysters, freshly shucked

1. Stir vinegar, shallot, and pepper in a small bowl. Drizzle over oysters. In restaurants, oysters can go for $2.50 to $3.50 a piece raw on the half shell and $4 and up when cooked. When purchased at a fish market and shucked at home, they can cost a little less than a $1 apiece. (Oysters are a bit difficult to open. A good way to learn how to shuck an oyster is to watch a video on You Tube.)

Once you have the mollusks home, store them in a strainer with a bag of ice on top. They need to be a bit colder than what can be achieved just in a refrigerator. The strainer is to assure they never sit in water. I use a cooler filled with ice and allow the cooler to drain as

the ice melts, storing the oysters no more than a day or so.

If you love oysters, you have probably had them raw on the half shell. I serve them with cocktail sauce laced with horseradish or, better yet, a shallot mignonette. But if the oysters are really fresh, a simple squeeze of lemon will suffice.

For cooked oysters, Rockefeller is an old standby, created in 1889 at Antoine’s Restaurant in New Orleans due to a shortage of escargot. The Rockefeller mixture, which includes spinach, garlic and breadcrumbs, is spooned on an oyster on the half shell and baked

The classic oysters Rockefeller is a baked dish that includes spinach, garlic and breadcrumbs.

until plump and heated through. I love the fried oyster po’boy, because the texture and flavor of a fried oyster. According to legend, a New Orleans shop provided free sandwiches for striking street car workers who were often referred to as poor boys. Po’boys can feature a variety of meat and seafood, but my favorite is made with fried oysters.

The bread is important, crusty on the outside but soft in the middle. This sandwich can be served simply, just oysters some melted butter and a remoulade sauce, or dressed with lettuce, tomato, pickles and either a remoulade or, my favorite, a Comeback sauce. Comeback sauce is a Southern classic that originated at Rotisserie, a Greek restaurant in Jackson, Mississippi. The name was taken from the traditional South

RECIPE | COURTESY OF CHEF CLYDE VAN ARSDALL IV Oysters Rockefeller

4 tablespoons unsalted butter 2 garlic cloves, minced ⅓ cup bread crumbs, panko preferred 2 shallots, chopped 2 cups fresh spinach, chopped ¼ cup Pernod Salt and pepper, to taste ½ teaspoon red pepper sauce (Tabasco) 2 tablespoons olive oil ¼ cup grated Parmesan 1 tablespoon chopped parsley 2 dozen oysters, on the half shell Rock salt (for serving) Lemon wedges, for garnish

1. Melt butter in a skillet. Sauté the garlic for 2 minutes to infuse the butter. Place the bread crumbs in a mixing bowl and add half the garlic butter, set aside. 2. To the remaining garlic butter in the skillet, add shallots and spinach, cook for 3 minutes until the spinach wilts. Deglaze the pan with Pernod. Season with salt and pepper and add a dash of red pepper sauce. Allow the mixture to cook down for a few minutes. 3. Finish off the bread crumbs by mixing in olive oil, Parmesan and season with salt and pepper. Spoon 1 heaping teaspoon of the spinach mixture on each oyster followed by a spoonful of the bread crumb mixture. 4. Sprinkle a baking pan amply with rock salt. Arrange the oysters in the salt to steady them. Bake in a preheated 450-degree oven for 10 to 15 minutes until golden. Serve with lemon wedges and red pepper sauce or mignonette sauce.

ern goodbye, “y’all come back” – the tasty sauce made sure they did. Grilled or charbroiled oysters are simply that: whole oysters thrown on the grill until they open. They can be eaten as-is or topped with garlic butter. Oysters can also be shucked before grilling and with a topping added. Abraham Lincoln made grilled oysters famous when he had them served on the White House lawn for his inauguration.

Oysters that are broiled are shucked first then topped with a sauce and run under the broiler until bubbling hot. This is the method to use if cooking indoors. Remember, the world is your oyster. Be bold and cook something new. Cheers!

• Clyde Van Arsdall is executive chef and general manager of the Neiman Marcus Café.

Grilled Oysters with Chipotle Bourbon Butter

This recipe is adapted from Hog Island Oyster Co. in Tomales Bay., north of San Francisco. You can easily make these under the broiler if you don't have a grill.

½ stick unsalted butter; 4 tablespoons softened to room temperature 2 tablespoons bourbon 2 tablespoons honey 2 garlic cloves, minced 1 chipotle chili in adobo sauce, minced 12 oysters, shucked

1. In a small food processor or mixing bowl, combine the butter, bourbon, honey, garlic and chipotle. Stir or pulse until well mixed. You can make the butter mixture up to 1 week ahead and refrigerate. If you're going to be cooking in the hot sun, make sure the butter is solid.

2. When ready to grill or broil, remove the butter from the fridge, and place a scant tablespoon on each shucked oyster. Place the oysters on the grill or on a baking sheet and under the broiler. Once the oysters and butter have bubbled and caramelized, remove them, about 3 minutes. Let cool slightly before enjoying. Note: You'll have an easier time incorporating the bourbon into the butter with a food processor. But the butter mixture can be a bit lumpy – it's going to melt anyway. If you're broiling the oysters, use small piles of salt under each shell to keep them upright; otherwise, the butter will spill all over the pan.