Bradshaw
Six dozen is too many breakfast oysters
Alexandre-Balthazar-Laurent Grimod de La Reynière, who died in 1857, was a lawyer by trade but was considered the first true restaurant critic in Paris, and probably anywhere. He wrote and published an annual “Almanach des Gourmands,” which was probably the first restaurant guide ever printed.
In his guide for 1803 he tells us that oysters are “almost indispensable” as the first course of a good hearty breakfast, but only in moderation, because “it is proved by experience that beyond five or six dozen, oysters certainly cease to be enjoyable.”
That’s even if its five or six dozen Louisiana oysters, which were described as “succulent, delicious, [and] with a world-wide reputation for superiority” by the Louisiana Department of Conservation in the first of a series of bulletins dealing with the state’s many natural resources “in a readable, concise, and practical manner.” (“The Louisiana Oyster, It’s Cultivation and Use,” Bulletin No. 1, December 1916.)
Oyster harvesting is one of the oldest parts of the Louisiana fishing industry and was the largest until the middle 1920s, when shrimping took the lead. The oyster species Crassostrea virginica is found all along the Atlantic coast and in the Gulf of Mexico, but the oysters in the Gulf tend to grow plumper than northern C. virginicas. Connoisseurs also claim the oysters harvested here have a special flavor that just isn’t found in oysters from any other place.
Bradshaw
The 1916 bulletin proclaimed it “inviting, easily digested … high in nutrition” and easy on the budget. The bulletin claims that nothing is more delicious than oysters eaten raw, “but neither can it be surpassed as a cooked food.”
According to the bulletin, “A family of four may dine sumptuously off of four dozen Louisiana oysters at a top cost for the choicest variety of one-half a dollar,” Bulletin No. 1 promised that “two dozen of these will make a delicious and nourishing gumbo filet – a Creole dish of unsurpassed excellence – and the remaining two dozen may be served in a variety of appetizing ways constituting an inviting and satisfying meal.”
Furthermore, “just a dozen fine, fat, Louisiana oysters added to some leftover fricasseed chicken, tripe a la Creole, or plain rice with tomatoes will constitute a piquant dish sufficient to do ample service for another meal, and at the same time the addition of the oysters lends to the ‘left-over’ a savory touch of novelty.”
The booklet offers more than twenty oyster recipes, “culled from various authentic sources” that are “only a few of the numerous delectable ways of preparing the oyster for table consumption,” They include stewed oysters, creamed oysters, Oysters a la Newberg, bacon and oysters, deviled oysters, panned oysters, pan roasted oysters on toast, an oyster salad, oysters with veal, oyster pie, oyster fritters, Oysters Rockefeller, Creole oyster croquettes. oyster boulettes, oyster jambalaya, and a handful more.
If you want to try oysters for breakfast as de La Reynière recommends, you might want to use the bulletin’s Oyster Scramble recipe: Take twenty or thirty oysters, drain them well, chop them fine, season them with salt and pepper, and set them aside. Then beat together six eggs, three tablespoons of cream, and one-half cupful of “forked bread.” I’m not sure just what forked bread is, but I presume it to be bread shredded with a fork.
Next melt a tablespoon of butter in a frying pan and pour in the well-beaten egg-cream-bread mixture. Stir in the chopped oysters just as the eggs are beginning to cook and scramble the whole thing together.
Oysters and eggs will cost a bit more today than the half-dollar advertised in the 1916 bulletin, but if we listen to the connoisseur’s advice, we don’t really need more than three or four dozen for a good meal. You can contact Jim Bradshaw at [email protected] or P.O. Box 1121, Washington LA 70589.
