The Oyster Bacteria

The Vibrio family--a group of marine bacteria that includes cholera--is responsible for most of the reported cases of illness after people eat raw oysters.

The most serious of these is Vibrio vulnificus, which can kill the very young or elderly or those with compromised immune systems. V. vulnificus is found in warm water and thus far has been restricted to oysters from the Gulf of Mexico. There it has been a sufficiently serious threat for health officials to call for the closing of the Gulf oyster season during warm weather months.

Vibrio parahaemolyticus, a less-potent cousin that can still cause severe gastric upset, has been detected in oysters from the Pacific Northwest. In fact, this summer there was a reported case in Southern California from Pacific Northwester oysters consumed here.

Both of these bacteria are most common in warm water and especially in the summer months, which is also when most oysters spawn--the famous months without an “R.”

The Splash of Wine

Drinking a crisp white wine with oysters accomplishes more than clearing the palate for the next oyster. The right wine interacts with that odd oyster combination of brininess and sweetness, enhancing the pleasure while finishing the experience.

Here’s what’s truly odd about the right oyster wine: You might not think much of it poured in a glass on its own. It’s instead a wine that comes alive at the seashore.

To find the right wines, restaurant seafood consultant Jon Rowley stages an annual December oyster wine tasting that comes down to 30 finalists after weeks of eating oysters and sipping wine. Ten winners are selected at panel tastings. There is no one overall winner because the point is to find wines that work well with oysters, and everyone’s experience of oysters is different.

Last year’s winners include: 1995 Amity Pinot Blanc (Oregon), 1993 Bridgeview Chardonnay “Barrel Select” (Oregon), 1995 Covey Run Fume Blanc (Washington), 1995 Dry Creek Chenin Blanc (California), 1995 Hedges Cellars Fume-Chardonnay (Washington), 1995 J. Fritz Melon (California), 1995 St. Supery Sauvignon Blanc (California), 1994 Trefethen Chardonnay (California), 1995 Vichon Chevrignon (California) and 1995 Washington Hills Chenin Blanc (Washington).

The Ale List, Please

Interestingly enough, when you drink ale with oysters, darker is better. Try porters and rich stouts. And don’t forget to mix a little ale in the shell after eating the oyster to mix with any of the oyster liquor left over. This moment of deliciousness simply does not work with white wine.

The Day the Oyster Died

This isn’t the first time around for America and the oyster.

Oysters have been an important part of the diet of anyone living anywhere near the oyster grounds of the Eastern seaboard, rich or poor. Oyster houses, oyster bars, oyster saloons and oyster cellars grew in proportion to the population.

As railroads spread out across the country, the oyster followed. By the turn of the century, oyster eating establishments in all the grand cities sometimes rivaled the best restaurants as places to be seen (and some times not seen), to cut deals, to rub shoulders. The classic San Francisco tomato catsup-based cocktail sauce served with oysters and shrimp alike may well have done its initial duty by masking the off-taste of oysters that had traveled across the country and were, as a result, a little road weary upon arrival.

There were West Coast oysters, too, the tiny Olympia (Ostrea lurida), found from Puget Sound to San Francisco Bay. But by the turn of the century, over-harvesting had all but wiped them out.

The same double-barreled threat descended on the Eastern oyster (Crassostrea virginica). They too were over-harvested and, as the country’s population and industry boomed, pollution followed right behind.

But the real decline came in the 1920s. It was common practice to harvest oysters and keep them in holding bays for shipping. Pollute the water with the right mix of raw sewage and you get typhoid traceable to oysters. Which is what happened.

Major epidemics occurred in Chicago, Philadelphia, New York. Hundreds died and thousands got sick. Coast to coast headlines shouted out the health risks of eating oysters, and the public responded. Oyster houses died overnight. The Chicago Health Department prohibited the consumption of oysters. There was a $25 fine for those who were caught.

Combine all that with Prohibition--because the conviviality that goes along with good wine or ale is central to enjoying oysters--and you are hearing a death knell.

The oyster as darling of America ceased to exist in all but a few places: the Grand Central Oyster Bar in New York, the Union Oyster House in Boston, the Cape Cod Room in the Drake Hotel in Chicago, Swan’s Oyster Depot in San Francisco. And, of course, the South in general, from rural oyster shacks to fresh shucked oyster bars in New Orleans.

And in Europe. The taste for oysters never let up in Europe, but it had to be rediscovered for us and reported back to us by the Hemingways and Fitzgeralds, the M.F.K. Fishers and Julia Childs of the world. And Henry Miller. It seems to me he had a thing or two to say about oysters.