Shell Game from p13 forget that other restaurants may be sourcing their oysters closer to home. It doesn’t even occur to us that they’d be coming from across the Gulf, bounced around for four or five days in the highest possible humidity during ex- treme heat warnings. The humidity, too, is a problem, Gilardi ac- knowledges. “Oysters don’t like to be shocked. They don’t like big changes in tem- perature. You have to keep them at around 42 degrees. If it hits 30 and then goes up to 60 and then back down to 40, they’re going to go bad or die.” This is one reason Gilardi is so firm about sourcing his oysters from cold-water farms located in places like Massachusetts, Prince Edward Island, Washington, and British Co- lumbia: less likelihood of water-to-air-to- truck temperature changes — although climate change is certainly making that more difficult everywhere, not just in the deep South. He also inspects each farm he con- tracts with to do business, watching how they load them for transport. He wants his oysters within two days out of the water and in his clients’ hands as soon as possible after that. To appreciate why Gilardi insists on cold- water oysters, it’s important to understand that these mollusks are filter feeders. They eat by extracting matter from the water. Whatever is being sieved through those little sponges at the time they’re harvested is also going into the body of whoever eats it. If that happens to be pathogenic bacteria, so be it. That’s why one oyster can be a lethal bite of poison and the one harvested next to it can be the typical delicacy we expect. How can you tell one from the other? You can’t. V. vulnificus is odorless, tasteless, and colorless. You won’t know it’s there. In fact, you don’t even have to eat it to contract the illness. If you have a cut that comes into con- tact with an infected oyster or its water, you could get sick. In other words, you could con- tract V. vulnificus by swimming in infected waters with an open wound. In terms of consuming it, though, you can easily kill V. vulnificus by cooking it. “I’ve had Florida oysters before. I love to cook with them because they’re meatier,” Gilardi says. “And that’s probably why some people find them attractive. That, and the price point. But they have more of a pond-water flavor profile as opposed to brininess or minerality.” Not to put too fine a point on it, but Gulf oysters are cheaper. According to Gilardi, a Louisiana Gulf oyster will cost a restaurant about 30 cents each as opposed to about $1.50, which is what Gilardi and fine-dining chefs like Michael Paley pay for their oysters. Paley, who heads up the new Klaw in Edge- water, has been working with Island Creek Oysters for the past decade. “They cut out the middleman,” he says. “The oysters come direct from their group of oyster farms in New Eng- land straight to our kitchen, most times in less than 24 hours since they were harvested. The quality is unmatched.” (Having dined on those raw oysters on our own dime at Klaw, New Times can attest to that fact.) Of course, you might pay a premium for 14 14 that kind of service at Klaw — we certainly did — where you can get oysters on the half shell or served as a clever “sidecar” with the “Mignonette” martini at its rooftop bar. Still, knowing where your oysters come from and how long it takes to get to you are two things completely under your control as a consumer. If the provenance of the proffered oyster isn’t clear from the menu, or the servers don’t know, you can ask to see the oyster tag at any restaurant. This is what identifies the oyster and also dates when it was harvested. Paley says, “In the restaurant, we keep the tags with the oysters until they are used, and then file the tags with the date the final oyster was sold. Read your shellfish tags. All oysters come with them.” Both Gilardi and Paley note that a properly sourced and cared-for oyster can have a re- frigerated shelf life of up to 21 days. But three weeks is really the outer limit. A restaurant that’s held on to oysters for three weeks might suddenly decide to have a $1 oyster happy hour to get rid of them. That’s right, you “A FRESH OYSTER SMELLS LIKE THE SEA, HAS PLUMP MEAT AND CLEAR LIQUOR.” probably should be suspicious of oyster happy hours. Gilardi confirms this, allow- ing that he rarely does such happy hours for clients because he not only loses money on the product but he feels that it disre- spects the hard work of oyster farmers. And he will never eat at one, knowing that most of them are serving old, improperly stored, or inexpensive Gulf oysters. Nor is V. vulnificus the only thing you have to watch out for when consuming oysters. Like clams, mussels, and other mollusks, oys- ters should be alive, their shells tightly sealed, when shucking them, whether you’re plan- ning to eat them raw or cooking them. At large events, like festivals, when shuckers have to plow through thousands of oysters, it’s easy to miss a partially opened one — which means it’s dead. Gilardi says the worst case of food poisoning he ever suffered was from a cooked oyster that was probably dead to begin with. He also recommends not eating oysters that have been sitting on ice in display cases. The temperature control here is all wrong, he notes, with the top of the shell too warm and the bottom too cold for the finicky creatures. Instead, oysters should be kept in the back of the refrigerator in a perforated bowl for air- flow, with a damp paper towel on top. And the flesh itself should never come into contact with fresh water. “Oysters like the same envi- ronment they came out of,” he says. But don’t let these issues — terroir, climate change, transportation, storage, age — scare you. As with mad cow disease, V. vulnificus- related deaths are grievous and unfortunate, especially for the families involved. But they’re not an epidemic. Instead, use these incidents as a warning to sharpen your expertise and expand your knowledge of enjoying fine oysters by follow- ing Paley’s advice. Above that, they have amazing, delicate differences in flavor based on their geographic location and the waters they grow in. Salinity, brine, vegetal notes — all of these things are characteristics of the best oysters.” And the best oysters — not the cheapest ones — are what you want to eat when you’re ordering them on the half shell. [email protected] SEPTEMBER 1-7, 2022 NEW TIMES | MUSIC | CAFE | CULTURE | NIGHT+DAY | NEWS | LETTERS | CONTENTS | miaminewtimes.com | browardpalmbeach.com MONTH XX–MONTH XX, 2008 MIAMI NEW TIMES | MUSIC | CAFE | FILM | ART | STAGE | NIGHT+DAY | METRO | RIPTIDE | LETTERS | CONTENTS | miaminewtimes.com
