In the mood for some oysters today. Headed over to ’ Diana’s ’ and bought a bunch of meaty and plump BC ones for some comparative tasting.
Narrowed down favorites to two, with near diametrically opposite taste profile!
’ Effingham ( left ) ’ - a familiar varietal. Plump and meaty. Dominated by a mildly briney and metallic, alkaline aftertaste.
’ Sand Dance ( right ) ’ - What a find! So good! Again, plump, meaty and chewy. However, this time this morsel is dominated by a delicate, ‘gorgeously sweet’ after taste…one of the sweetest oysters I’ve come across.
To my favorite oyster list of French Belon, Irish Galway Flats, English Colchester and American Blue Point, I am adding this yummy Canadian ’ Sand Dance ’ to it!
(sigh)
there are so many “local names” applied to oysters, it’s quite impossible to track them all.
like “Sand Dance” - a search turns up nothing - except “Sand Dune” - a PEI source…
also French Belon - originally French, since cultivated / available from cold water areas, Maine, etc.
so is Maine Belon a “French Belon?”
have you any oyster by mail order experience?
we have - what for our area is a superb fishmonger - but their oyster selection is a bit on the limited side . . .
I am on their email list, so I’m sure they will. Don’t know why I haven’t ordered from them yet. They do seem like a good option right now ! Delivery is higher than Giovanni, but 20 percent off until tomorrow.
I don’t know $1 oysters were ever that profitable. These were common during the early happy hours at local bars (the 4-5:30 or 4-6pm crowds) when there were plenty of workers in offices, and meeting up for drinks after work was a popular activity. It was always about plying the worker to spend at the bar, while they had a few cheap oysters. Locally, they rarely offered oysters you might find on popular seafood restaurants and raw bar menus; they were always less prized varieties.
Several of my coworkers came from oyster farming and fisherman families (in the MA area), so definitely a labor intensive process for any of that seafood processing. It’s not just a scoop, dump and clean operation. A good friend/coworker’s dad was part of the Island Creek oyster farming operations, so she always had good access to lots of yummy seafood, and oysters in particular.
Yeah, I don’t think I’ve seen dollar oysters since 2018 or so, and as you say, those were always a happy hour or early bird special or something like. Even going out to the CA coast (a mere couple of hours drive that I have made on a whim before), anything decent under $2/ea is a bargain.
