Baseball, Ballparks, & Seafood

I pretty much write about whatever I find interesting at the time and find a way to tie it to oysters or seafood.  Philadelphia hoagies, the history of chili peppers, unconventionally flavored potato chips.  Luckily, most of my interests are culinarily focused or akin, so it aligns rather easily.  I enjoy gardening, so I made a ceviche with homegrown produce.  I like underrepresented history, so I did a piece on famous oysterman and abolitionist Thomas Downing.  However, I'm also a massive sports fan, and nothing is better than playoff baseball, especially with the Phillies in the mix.  #RingTheBell.  #RedOctober.  So, as we're heading into the MLB postseason, I wanted to do an exploration of ballpark cuisine with a seafood twist.

Of all the professional sports, none is more closely tied to culinary fare than baseball.  Popcorn, beer, soft pretzels.  It's a stop-and-go game full of frequent lulls that are perfect for grabbing some grub.  Some say a ballgame isn't the same without a hot dog, others say a hot dog isn't the same without a ballgame.  Baseball is also full of tense moments and nervous energy, perfect fidget snacks like sunflower seeds and peanuts.  The iconic 7th inning stretch's Take Me Out to the Ball Game literally has ballpark culinary staples right in the lyrics.  I don't even need to say them and any American reading this knows exactly what those foods are.  If you think about it, that's objectively pretty funny.     

via TheBayOnline.com

Seafood and baseball are closely tied as well.  Beach season and baseball season are the twin tides of summer.  And over the last few decades, several seafood offerings have steadily flowed into the ballpark.  Oracle Park's garlic crab fries, Fenway Park's lobster rolls, T-Mobile Park's poke bowls.  The Baltimore Orioles have hosted Crab Fest games at Camden Yards, and the Milwaukee Brewers reportedly have a secret Friday Fish Fry in American Family Field's section 208.  Double A's Richmond Flying Squirrels even showcased a 300 pound monstrosity earlier this year with the world's largest crab cake.  I hope it at least tasted good.

Beyond the dishes, many ballplayers have been dubbed with seafood nicknames.  Tim Salmon and Mike Trout might not count, but Catfish Hunter and Oyster Burns certainly do.  Several minor league teams' names and mascots are also seafood inspired.  The Biloxi Shuckers, Jersey Shore Blue Claws, Jacksonville Jumbo Shrimp.  There's a collegiate league team out of Seattle known as the DubSea Fish Sticks.  The Carolina Mudcats have Muddy, a flathead catfish, as their mascot, and Japan's Chiba Lotte Marines have Nazo No Sakana (謎の魚), or Mysterious Fish, as their mascot.

Things have become even more fun with minor league baseball's alternate identities.  Back in 2014, the Lehigh Valley Iron Pigs decided to don bacon uniforms for a series.  The following year, the Fresno Grizzlies became the Fresno Tacos for a weekend.  Ever since, whether it be via the Copa de la Diversión or Stouffer's Alter Ego Challenge, MiLB teams have been embracing regional culture, economy, and cuisine in rebranding for a couple of games a season.  As few things are as fiercely tied to regional identity as food, many of these rebrands have paid homage to local delicacies.  And many are seafood themed.  The Fort Myers Mighty Mussels became the Grouper Sandwiches; the Portland Sea Dogs were the Maine Clambake; and the Morehead City Marlins switched to the Fish Tacos.  I won't lie, I find the MiLB alter egos concept so enjoyable, especially in contrast to the MLB's City Connect jerseys.  The Augusta Pimento Cheese and Erie Pepperoni Balls, yes please!  The Phillies and Twins dressed like cans of Axe Body Spray, no thanks.   

However, nothing can beat the Chesapeake Baysox' temporary rebrand as the Oystercatchers, a seabird native to the area.  In short, the Baysox initially released the baseball glove with an oyster and baseball pearl as part of their rebranded logo, pictured here.  And, well, many fans saw something less catcher's mitt with an oyster and more of a "third base" situation.  My favorite quote had to be "most men can't even find the baseball."  They quickly took the NSFW rebrand down from all socials, but it had already gone viral.  In laudable fashion, they owned it and brought it back for merchandising, donating 10% of proceeds to Cervivor, Inc., a non-profit focused on cervical cancer awareness.  You can't make this shit up.  Minor league baseball is the best, and this is MiLB at its finest: absurd, self-aware, and community-driven.

Ballpark Food History

Stevens Scorecard via Our Game

 Alter egos, animated mascots, and celebrated cuisines were not always part of baseball.  Records of the first foods at ballgames are sparse and disputed, and concessions were relatively disorganized and ad hoc — apples, lemonade, ham & cheese sandwiches, beer, ice cream, pasta, even charred onions and tripe.  Then, in the 1880s, Harry M. Stevens began shaping the ballpark cuisine landscape we think of today.   Posthumously known as the King of Concessions, Stevens' beginnings weren't even in food sales.  He started by selling scorecards at Columbus Buckeyes games, a novel concept at the time.  He added food advertising to those scorecards, and eventually sold the food itself at ballgames.  Stevens' business quickly spread to ballparks and stadiums all across the country, essentially codifying concession offerings.  The invention of the hot dog is often mistakenly credited to Stevens, but he was responsible for popularizing them at ballparks.  He's also credited with bringing peanuts to the game.  Story goes that a peanut company wanted to advertise in Stevens' scorecards, but was unable to pay.  Stevens accepted literal peanuts as payment, then resold them at ballgames.   They were so successful that he eventually bought a peanut farm in Virginia to vertically source them.  This is also a speculated origin for the phrase "working for peanuts."

Stevens passed away in 1934, but the concessions game continued on.  Ballparks themselves followed America's Post-WWII car and highway development and migration from cities to suburbs.  Stadiums became soulless, concrete multi-purpose shells in the industrial outskirts of town, prioritizing capacity over quality.  The food largely followed.  Some diversity came in the form of nachos and pizza, but they served mostly the classics.  That's not inherently an issue, but it was when the quality decreased.  Stale soft pretzels, tepid hot dogs, rubbery burgers; the AstroTurf of cuisine.  Concessions operations became consolidated to a few major conglomerates, and they mirrored the prioritization of capacity over quality.  Even today, all 30 MLB teams' concession programs are operated by just six companies.  The rise of agribusiness in the 60's and 70's diminished our foodways well beyond just the ballpark's, but that's a whole other conversation. 

  

However, when Camden Yards opened near Baltimore's Inner Harbor in 1992, ballpark culture started to shift again.  Stadiums began moving away from sprawling parking lots and back into cities' downtowns.  The Orioles' concession company partnered with local vendors to serve regional cuisine like crab cakes and pit beef.  This kicked off the ballpark renaissance, and over half the league built new stadiums in the next 15 years.  They began reconnecting with their local identities, both geographically and culinarily.  Cheesesteaks at Phillies' games, BBQ at Royals' games, Skyline Chili at Reds' games.  30 years later, we've now entered the era of epic ballpark cuisine where clubs try to one up each other with the most extreme dishes.  Cotton candy fries, mac 'n' cheese hot dogs, s'mores quesadillas, two-foot burritos, toasted crickets.  Some people celebrate the direction ballpark cuisine is now heading, and others utterly despise it.  I see both sides.  The Boomstick Burger and What Up Corn Dog look disgusting, but I loved the Banana Dog at a Savannah Bananas game.  And that's okay.  Some dishes are home runs, others are 'a swing and a miss.'  Either way, it's all pretty damn fun.

So, in that spirit of ballpark whimsy and fun, I set out to reimagine some of baseball's culinary classics with a seafood twist.  Let's kick it off with "....buy me some shrimp at the seafood shack, I don't care if I never get back...."  Maybe "hook, line, sinker you're out?"  Whatever...play ball!

Blue Crab Nachos

While not canon in classic ballpark cuisine, nachos have become a staple at practically every stadium.  As noted, hot dogs, peanuts, and popcorn go back to the early 20th century.  Nachos at ballgames first appeared the 1970s.  The original nachos, invented in the 1940s on the US-Mexico border, were fried tortilla chips, jalapeños, and cheese baked in an industrial oven.  Not an ideal offering for fast paced concession stands.  However, in 1976, Frank Liberto of Ricos Foods invented a shelf stable, pourable spicy cheese sauce, enabling nachos to be served efficiently.  Liberto first sold them at Arlington Stadium for a Texas Rangers' game, and they were an instant hit.  Within a decade, nachos with cheese sauce were being sold at practically every convenience store, concert, movie theater, and of course, ballpark.

Everyone loves nachos.  Pretty much everyone loves crab.  And everyone I know loves crab nachos.  It's a well established dish, and was a no brainer to kick off my ballpark seafood trials.  I picked up ½ pound of fresh picked lump blue crab meat on my way back from a brief trip to the shore.  Once home, I grated Tillamook cheddar over Mission tortilla rounds, added the crab with pickled jalapeños, black olives, and ample amounts of Old Bay.  Into a 400° oven it went and additional toppings were up next.  I mixed up a quick pico de gallo with some garden fresh tomatoes, peppers, garlic, cilantro and lime.  I also made a crab-seasoned nacho cheese sauce with a roux, heavy cream, shredded cheddar, Old Bay and a little bit of the pickled jalapeño brine.

After about 15 minutes, the crab nachos were bubbly brown and ready to go.  I took them out of the oven and drizzled on the cheese sauce with a few dollops of Daisy.  Cheeky little Old Bay seasoned lime and it was time to serve.  They were delicious, at least from the few bites I had.  Cheesy, savory, and spicy with a bright acidity from the pico de gallo and sweet, briny bites of lump crab meat.  I'm sure my wife and kids would have articulated the same.  But, instead of bases, they were too busy stealing chips and clearing plates.  Hey, at least I tried.  Nacho easiest pun situation.  

Seafood Bratwurst 

The natural choice here would be seafood hot dogs.  I made and profiled smoked trout dogs a few years ago, which were delightful, but I wanted to try something new.  Next to the classic ballpark frank, nothing says I'm at a ballgame quite like a brat.  I picked up some day-boat scallops, monkfish, and a Northern Atlantic lobster tail from Hill's Quality Seafood.  Chef Cuso's rustic style of seafood sausage looked interesting, but I was swinging for the fences on this one.  Proper sausage maker, 10mm plate, coarse grind, stuffing in hog casings. 

The seafood all got a rough chop and mixed with proportional bratwurst seasoning.  I've made pork bratwurst several times before, both by toasting and grinding my own spices, and using premade spice mixtures.  Maybe I'm just an inept spice crafter, but the premade mixtures have always turned out better for me, especially with A.C. Legg's Bratwurst Seasoning.  Don't mess with a winning lineup, right?  I set the mixture in the freezer to chill and meld for a few minutes.  Rule one of sausage making is keeping everything ice cold.  Otherwise the fat will render and the meat will smear, leaving you with a nasty paste rather than a coarse grind.  I wasn't sure the same logic applied to shellfish, but I wasn't about to test and find out. 

My wife is from Wisconsin.  As such, I know a brat is not a brat without peppers and onions, so I sautéed some while I waited.  Once the seafood mix was fully chilled, I added a little lager (Wisconsin-style, again) then ran it through the coarse grind and into hog casings.  I ended up with only two brats, but they were big league sized.  Seafood's expensive, and I'm a baller on a budget.  Onto the grill they went for 5 minutes, then into some Amoroso's Italian Rolls with the peppers and onions, horseradish, and spicy mustard.  Give 'em the heater, Ricky!  And they were delicious.  Discernibly bratwurst with that herbaceous, peppery-nutmeg flavor, but they had a distinct, oceanic sweetness, especially from the toothsome lobster.  The caramelized peppers and onions brought in that familiar savory-sweet and the horseradish a piquant zest.  I shared the other with my neighbor, and he agreed: web gem worthy.

    Rock Shrimp Cracker Jack

No ballpark cuisine post would be complete without Cracker Jack.  Recipes for candied popcorn & peanuts in the States go back to the early 19th century.  However, Frederick Rueckheim is largely credited with its popularization.  He and his brother first reportedly offered it at the 1893 World's Fair.  A patron tried some and declared "whoa, that's crackerjack!," which was slang for something excellent or outstanding.  Rueckheim trademarked the name Cracker Jack in 1896, and in that same year, there's record of it being a concession at an Atlantic City game.  Then, in 1908, Jack Norworth penned Take Me Out to the Ball Game and Cracker Jack was forever deified within baseball.  Just imagine what food that might be if "and Cracker Jack" didn't rhyme with "never get back."  Also, I don't say deified lightly.  Check out what happened when the Yankees tried to replace Cracker Jack with Crunch 'n Munch.

Cracker Jack is made with popcorn, right?  And popcorn shrimp is a popular dish.  So why not shrimp cracker jack?  I picked up some rock shrimp from Hill's Quality Seafood, along with peanuts, molasses, and other fixins' at my local market.  Cracker Jack has those distinct, red skinned Virginia peanuts, and most markets around me don't sell them in shelled, cocktail form.  No problem, though — I had the kids shell (or shuck!) them.  They were more than happy to be involved.  I also created a simple brown sugar syrup with some vanilla extract and molasses and set it to the side.  I wanted to mimic that Cracker Jack candy flavor, but that classic butter based caramel wouldn't work in this instance.  Next, batter up!  I mixed water with equal parts AP flour and potato starch, per the instruction of Dredgemaster Flex, a.k.a. Rizzi from Lou's Takeaway.  Dude knows how to fry.  The AP would create that familiar popcorn shrimp breading, and the potato starch would ensure it stayed crisp enough to hold up to the caramel coating.    

Now, time to fry.  Each shrimp got battered and dropped in a peanut oil bubble bath.  Sure, seed oils are the enemy these days.  Red meat, eggs, and avocados were all once too, but now look at them.  I'm not saying red dye 40 and soybean oil will be deemed superfoods at some point; but everyone should chill out for a bit and let science catch up to the clickbait.  Stay hydrated, eat more fiber, and all things in moderation.  You'll be fine.  Once all the shrimp were done, I returned them in batches to the frying oil for a second dip.  Just like twice fried potatoes, this would ensure the ultimate crispy exterior.  Finally, I mixed the shrimp, peanuts, and caramel sauce all in a bowl, seasoned to taste, and plated.  They weren't as close to Cracker Jack as I'd hoped, but did taste great.  Just more like Honey Walnut Shrimp than the ballpark classic.  Not quite a home run, but a solid line drive up the middle.  I'll need to hit the cages in the offseason for this one.  Will keep y'all posted.

Overall, my whole baseball, ballpark, and seafood exploration was a grand slam.  Interesting history, exciting ephemera, and some fun dishes.  The only remaining question: what to do next?  Lobster poutine for the Stanley Cup?  Fish and chips with caviar for Wimbledon?  Salmon buffalo wings for the Super Bowl?  Oh — what about oyster baseball cards for the hundreds of varieties around the country?!?  Comment below with what should be 'on deck.'

Cheers,

The SF Oyster Nerd

   

Shucked Ceviche

Every summer I try to bridge two of my favorite hobbies - gardening and seafood - into a post.  It started with an oyster shell paved garden path.  Then, it was pairing oysters with farm-fresh eggs from chickens our neighbors raise.  After that, it was turning homegrown peppers into hot sauce for an oyster condiment.  I won't lie, I've found it takes a lot of creative grasping and poetic license to pair seafood and gardening.  Wish I were as clever as The Beatles.  Sure, I could just run through seasonal fish recipes, paired with garden fresh produce.  Lobster BLTs, pan seared halibut over summer succotash, mahi mahi tacos with charred corn salsa, grilled ahi tuna and sesame cucumber salad.  All delicious, but a bit boring.  There's already plenty from the content creating clickbaiters.  "OMG you guys! Run, don't walk, to these amazing salmon recipes! #DeInfluence.  I like some history, exploration, or at the very least, a little whimsy.  Whether successful or not is a different story, but that's usually my aim.  

This year I leaned into the gimmick side.  The kids and I tackled our annual English pea harvest earlier this summer.  I always sow a few different pea varieties around St. Patrick's day, along with other frost tolerant plants like radishes, kale, beets, and lettuce.  This means that come Juneteenth, the garden is overflowing with peas.  My children won't touch a pea on a plate, but somehow love grabbing them right off the vine and enjoying as a snack.  The big harvest has become a bit of a tradition.  One day each year, usually a Saturday or Sunday in late June, we wake up and head to the backyard.  With warm morning dew on our feet and popcorn bowls in hand, we gently pluck each pod from the garden.  Then, we hang out on the deck, sipping coffee and juice, listening to reggae, and process the peas.

When my daughter said "I love shucking peas" this year, it got me thinking - what other foods do we shuck?  Is there a reason that we shuck corn but peel bananas, hull sunflower seeds, and husk coconuts?  I've heard shell and shuck used interchangeably for peas, but shell and shuck for beans can mean entirely different things.  What about peeling shrimp, cracking crabs, and shucking oysters?  I really enjoy weird etymology, bizarre grammar, and strange lexicon.  Why do we drive on a parkway and park on a driveway?  What cruel person decided the fear of long words should be "hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia?"  Do you think they named oranges before they named carrots?

According to the Britannica dictionary, and similarly across Cambridge, Merriam-Webster, and others, the most common, contemporary definitions of shuck are.

shuck (n):  

the outer covering of a nut or a plant (such as corn); the shell of an oyster or clam

shuck (v): 

to remove the outer covering of (a plant, such as corn) or the shell of (an oyster)

The true etymology of the word is unknown.  Just ask Gemini, ChatGPT, or any other LLM and you'll get a host of different answers.  That's because these models are programmed to never admit uncertainty, even when sources conflict.  I love a good AI hallucination, but I'm pretty excited to see the AI bubble burst.  I'm by no means a luddite; I use “AI” for data processing and organization at work all the time.  It can do incredible things, and will only get better.  But presently, it's more akin to a search engine on steroids than intelligence.  It's a streamlined parrot of the internet.  It doesn't reason or understand.  Rather, it's being deliberately engineered to seem it can for quick investments and money grabs.  In the worst cases, it's even being fraudulently propped up.  The hype will eventually collapse.

Abraham Fleming's 1577 account
of The Black Shuck

Anyway, while the true origins of shuck are lost to time, there is still reasonable speculation.  The front-runners seem to be Old English's scucca, Low German's schok, and Dutch's schokke, all of which were used in reference to husks, shells, or coverings.  According to The Oxford University Press, the earliest use of shuck with current definitions was as a noun in 1674.  Funny enough, it was describing pea and bean pods, e.g. pea-shucks.  In 1785 we first see shuck as a verb, detailing corn shucking, and we see oyster shucking references in the mid-1800s.  Curiously, the Old English, German, and Dutch words also meant to shake, shrink, terrify or be frightened and shocked.  There's record of shuck, scucca specifically, denoting a devil or demon going back to the 11th century.  References to The Black Shuck, a demon dog said to roam the British coastlines of East Anglia, go back to the 16th century.  Gives a totally different meaning to "Live to Shuck, Shuck to Live" through that lens 😬.  Perhaps shuck around and find out is more appropriate?  Just jokes.  Love my Hog Island homies.      

In American English, shuck gradually evolved to take on other meanings throughout the 19th and 20th centuries.  I'm sure you're familiar with the interjection "shucks," such as "aw shucks," expressing mild embarrassment or disappointment.  Less commonly, there's shucking off clothing or a bad reputation, as in to discard.  It also meant something valueless in the 1800s, like "it wasn't worth a shuck."  More recently there's the practice of shucking hard drives, which is taking an external drive and repurposing it internally.  Modern variations of shuck are also based in African American Vernacular English.  A shuck can be a fraud or scheme, or to shuck can mean to deceive or trick.  Think of shuckin' and jivin', which has its unfortunate foundations with the Black community evading undue attention from the authorities.  Equally unfortunate is the phrase's racially coded appropriation nowadays, and some don't even realize that when they use it.

I'm not a linguist, computer scientist, or race relations expert, so take all of this with a grain of salt.  My research often amounts to shuck.  But with that salt, I can confidently say I'm damn good at making well-seasoned and flavorful seafood preparations.  So while the etymology and history of the word shuck are fun, I wanted to make a dish with my kids celebrating all things shucked.  With our homegrown English peas shucked and on hand, fresh clams, corn, scallops, and oysters all came to mind.  Honestly, I couldn't think of many other shuckables.  No problem, though, because all that sounded like the start of one tasty ceviche.  

My son and I headed to Gentile's Market in Newtown Square.  They've always got the best seasonal produce in stock.  We picked up some ceviche basics - limes, shallots, fresno chiles, green onions, and cilantro.  For the shucking portion, we of course grabbed a few ears of fresh Jersey sweet corn.  Every region of the country has its own celebrated corn basket, and I'm not going to say Jersey's is better than Nebraska, Iowa, or anywhere else.  However, New Jersey is known as the Garden State for a reason, and their produce is top notch.  There are a lot of reasons to hate on New Jersey, but their corn isn't one of them.  Again, just jokes.  Nothing but love for ya, Dirty Jerz.

Next, we headed right across the street to Hill's Quality Seafood to pick up some littleneck clams, scallops, and a single oyster.  I've had and made oyster ceviches before and must admit they're not my favorite.  I like Veracruz's vuelve a la vida, which usually includes oysters.  And the line between ceviches and other Latin American or global raw seafood dishes is a blurry one.  Aguachile, poke, kinilaw, tartare, coctel, tiradito.  An oyster on the half shell is technically just a crudo.  So I do like innumerable raw oyster preparations.  However, shucking and mixing loose oysters into the classic ceviche mix of citrus, chiles, and alliums isn't my cup of tea.  There's something about the oysters' texture, in volume and concentration, swimming around in the leche de tigre that doesn't work for me.  They just don't have the right tooth or body to stand up, and I end up feeling like I'm eating them just for the protein.  That being said, you know I had to incorporate at least one oyster into my shucked ceviche.

We halved the limes, chopped the cilantro, sliced the green onion, and brunoised the shallot and fresno.  By we, I mean the kids got to massacre a few green onions and some cilantro on the side with their plastic knives while I managed the rest.  They did shuck the corn and I sliced some kernels off the cobs.  The diver scallops got diced too.  Next, it was onto the clams.  Same logic as the oysters, raw clams aren't great in ceviche, in my experience.  However, while cooked oysters aren't either as their texture remains rather supple, cooked clams take on a nice, firm texture that holds up well.  We steamed the clams for 10 mins, and once cooled, the kids and I shucked them from their shells with some butter knives.  They absolutely loved this part, and it was toddler safe.  Last, the single Wellfleet oyster.  Ceviches are often finished with crunchy toppings, adding a nice contrast to the bright and acidic base.  And few things are better than a golden brown, crispy fried oyster.  I shucked it, dredged in corn meal, and deep fried in canola oil for a few minutes.  I set it to the side, and with the prep ready to go, it was finally ceviche making time.  

Prep is the laborious part of ceviche.  Fine dices, uniform knife cuts, lots of squeezing citrus.  All very important.  A shoddy chop on onions is no major issue when sautéing, but when eating them basically raw, a millimeter or two can make a big difference.  And bottled lime juice isn't even close to fresh, so never cut any corners here.  The juice is quite literally worth the squeeze.  However, once finished, the rest of ceviche making is just mixing things in a bowl and seasoning.  Quite easy.  Depending on the type of seafood, it can help to marinate it in citrus juice for 15 to 20 minutes before adding the rest of the ingredients.  The acid denatures the proteins of the seafood, both firming and tenderizing while giving it that 'cooked' appearance.  In this instance, the clams were already cooked and I wanted to keep the scallops crudo, so no marination on this one.  The other key step is combining everything in a bowl over ice.  Ceviche should be served ice cold, and this set up helps ensure that.  You can even find special bowls for serving ceviches, tartares, and other dishes that need to be kept chilled. 

Shallot, fresno, cilantro, sweet corn, peas, clams and scallops all came together in the icy bowl with ample amounts of lime juice and kosher salt to taste, then got plated in a hand thrown bowl a friend gifted to us.  I thought of finishing it with some spicy peanuts or pistachios, as you'll occasionally hear of shuckin' both.  However, I decided to stay classic and added some canchas.  They're basically Peruvian corn nuts and are a standard accompaniment to Andean ceviches.  We didn't personally shuck and make them, but they were certainly shucked at some point.  Topped off with some green onion, a little more cilantro, and of course the fried oyster, the ceviche was good to go.  And it tasted great.  Spicy, tart, savory, tangy.  Various levels of sweet ranging from the corn and peas' earthy sweetness to the clams and scallops' oceanic.  The canchas and oyster provided great textural contrast and saltiness.  All spot on with no edits, and a delightful bite on a warm summer's day.  

Wish I could say my kids felt the same.  Since they were integral in the whole production, they were champs and gave it a try.  But I suppose ceviche is more of an acquired taste.  I'm not giving up, though.  They'll be ceviche fiends just like me at some point.  However, I can positively report they're now avid shuckers, and nothing makes me happier than that.  I hope y'all enjoy the rest of your summer and get a few chances to have some shuckin' fun! 

Cheers,

The SF Oyster Nerd

Charcoal Oysters

"Grilled" Oysters from Hog Island

Summertime is in full swing here in the Mid-Atlantic.  Balmy days, warm nights, Jersey shore trips, raucous community pools.  Wawa's Hoagiefest is going hard and Rita's Water Ice lines are around the block.  Neighborhood kids are playing barefoot wiffle ball while parents exchange garden fresh tomatoes.  There's an indescribable yet very tangible joy that runs through the whole region this time of year.  I really missed it while living on the West Coast.  Sure, there were equally if not more beautiful days and seasons in California.  That's why it's such a desirable, and expensive, place to live.  But you need those contrasting, bitterly cold winter months to feel that true jubilation for the summer ones.  And of all the things I love about an East Coast summer, one of my favorites has to be the backyard barbecues that are ripping hot on a daily basis.

The summer, however, is a bit of a peculiar time for oysters.  Historically, they've been a seasonal food, reserved for harvest and consumption in late fall through early spring.  You know, the old "only eat oysters in months that have an 'R'" adage.  It's still largely observed in many parts of the Gulf Coast and Southeastern US.  And there are a few sound reasons for this longstanding practice:

• 

  Funny Book No. 6

  Oysters, once out of the water, must be kept cold or they'll spoil.  Refrigerated shipping and storage are relatively new.  We've eaten oysters for millennia, but properly chilled storage year-round is less than 100 years old.  As such, fresh oysters could only be safely harvested, shipped, stored, and consumed in colder months for most of our history.
  
  
• The warmer waters of summer breed more dangerous bacteria and algal blooms.  Oysters are filter feeders, so if anything harmful is in the ecosystem, they're one of the first species to pick it up.  Before regulatory oversight and water quality monitoring, oysters in the summer were harvested and consumed at one's own risk.
  
  
• Like many species, oysters procreate seasonally.  The warmer waters of May and June signal oysters that it's time to breed.  Throughout history, most societies knew that maintaining sustainable harvests of any wild food meant leaving it alone while it was reproducing.  And before oyster farming became the standard it is today, people were mostly reliant on wild reefs for their oyster fix.       

Fortunately, most of these concerns no longer apply.  Oysters are safely chilled and shipped or stored all around the world.  You can even express overnight them with ice packs directly from oyster farmers.  Government agencies diligently monitor water quality at shellfish farming and harvesting grounds, so no need for that Penicillin mignonette.  It's more likely you'll get ill from tainted lettuces or compromised lunch meats.  And nowadays, roughly 95% of the oysters we consume in North America are bred and farmed.  Wild oyster restoration is still desperately needed for a host of other reasons, but eating oysters year-round no longer threatens their wild populations.  The "months with R" dogma still persists, and many in the oyster industry are doing their best to dispel it.  Prominent publications annually shed some light on the topic, oyster festivals are common now during summer months, and official National Oyster Day is even in August.

Triploid & Spawny Oyster via Fukui NA

However, the one thing that remains is the quality of oysters in the summer months.  Don't get me wrong, I'll crush a dozen raw oysters any time of the year.  But they are undeniably better during the winter.  Oysters store up glycogen reserves so they can basically hibernate during the cold months.  This makes them rich, plump, and full of flavor.  Come late spring or summer, they've either converted their remaining reserves to gamete for procreation, creating a slightly creamier oyster, or they've exhausted those reserves, leading to a leaner, less flavorful oyster.  They're fine, just not the best quality, like a grocery store tomato in January.  Farmers have worked around this a bit by breeding triploid oysters, but triploids' long term viability is in question.  So with summer oysters, I say there's only one thing to do - supplement with flavor and fire!

Drago's' "Charbroiled" Oysters

During the warmer months, my favorite way to cook oysters is outdoors over charcoal.  However, the question that bothered me: what is that called?  If you go by arguably the most famous iteration of oysters over charcoal, Drago's in Louisiana, it's charbroiled.  You also see this version referred to as chargrilled, and the same is true in most establishments across the South.  Elsewhere in the US, on most menus or in most recipes, they're simply called grilled oysters.  The disclaimer here is that they may be fired over coals, wood, or gas.  In some instances, they're BBQ or barbecued oysters.  Now, we're all adults here and know the difference between grilling and "proper BBQ," so I'm not opening that can of beans (Get it?  Because beans go well with BBQ.  Worms don't go well with BBQ).  I like smoked oysters, but I don't think anyone would classify them as American pitmaster fare.  Across the pond, what we call a broiler the British call a grill.  What we call a grill (or a BBQ in some areas), they exclusively call a BBQ.  What do they call their oysters cooked over charcoal?  There's also W.C. Bradley Co. with their trademarked line of products named Char-Broil® or Charbroil®.  And those are mostly outdoor grills and BBQs.   So I am confusion.

The reality is that regardless of all the regional parlance and differing nomenclature, the methodology is essentially the same.  Shuck oysters, add fats with seasonings, place the oysters on a metal grate with fire below, cook.  So, in a nod to Josh Niland, I'm just going with "Charcoal Oysters" and calling it a day.  

Charcoal Oysters

I'm a big fan of the vegetable-forward

"Grilled" Oysters at Greystone

movement we've seen in cooking over the last decade.  It's not vegetarian or vegan, but rather a celebration of seasonal produce with sustainability in mind.  Peak quality vegetables are the focus of main dishes and often supplemented with animal proteins; it's a complete inversion of the classic meat-main-vegetable-side.  Stewed chickpeas with spicy sausage, roasted carrots with beef tallow, grilled asparagus with crispy chicken skin.  The BLT, a tomato sandwich seasoned with bacon, is the OG of vegetable-forward dishes.  Vegetable focused cooking is also a direction we'd all benefit moving towards.  Edge practices aside, vegetable production is more environmentally friendly and sustainable than animal production.  Vegetable consumption, writ large, is also healthier than animal protein consumption.  Despite all the snake oil supplements and paleo meal plans influencers are constantly throwing in our faces, we all know in our heart of hearts that a good diet isn't too complicated.  Michael Pollan's "Eat Food.  Not too much.  Mostly plants." summed it up pretty well 20 years ago.  

I carried this logic over to my charcoal oyster project.  Oysters, after all, are arguably one the most sustainable farmed items around, more so than some vegetables.  Seasoning with animal proteins is also delicious.  Traditional chargrilled oysters are composed of a garlic and herb compound butter with lemon and topped with parmesan cheese.  This is the Drago's classic.  Other notable versions include Cajun butter, classic BBQ sauce, and chipotle bourbon.  I wanted to push the limits of traditional.  As Julia Child used to say, "fat gives things flavor," so with oysters in the cooler and coals smokin' hot, let's get it! 

Mexican Chorizo & Cilantro

I say it time and time again: salty pig parts and shellfish is a brilliant pairing.  And few dishes are more representative of that than grilled oysters with chorizo.  I've also made this exact dish dozens of times.  So much that I'm almost annoyed by how frequently friends and family request it at get-togethers.  However, I figured it best to start with a sure-fire hit in my charcoal oyster and animal seasoning experiment.  Build a little confidence.  I rendered some chorizo on low heat to extract as much fat and flavor as possible.  Then I mixed in a little cilantro once slightly cooled and set it aside for topping oysters.  What's the saying?  "Sometimes simple is simply the best."  Feels appropriate for this dish. 

Beef Bone Marrow & Parsley

Bone marrow is a pretty polarizing food.  There are those who think it's disgusting and refuse to try it.  Then there are those who have tried it and love it, because, well, it's delicious.  Rich, beefy, and unctuous in all the right ways.  This one felt like a no brainer.  I purged some canoe cut beef marrow bones in salt water overnight to remove any particulate.  Next, I rinsed, lightly seasoned, and roasted them for 20 minutes.  Once cooked, I mixed half of the marrow into some crispy garlic sauteed in butter.  When cooled, I added in a little parsley and set it aside for topping oysters.  The other half of the marrow was a nice lunchtime treat spread over toasted sourdough.   

Schmaltz & Thyme

Schmaltz is the Yiddish word for rendered poultry fat, typically chicken.  It's got a fascinating history, being widely adopted by Central and Eastern European Jews through a combination of Kosher diets, limited resources, and land discrimination.  Another example of some of the best foods coming from hardship.  It's also known as liquid gold, and is the not-so-secret secret behind much Ashkenazi cooking.  Put it in pretty much anything and it's going to taste great.  I bought six bone-in chicken thighs and butchered out the bones and skin for stock and rendering.  The thigh meat was repurposed for a chicken adobo taco Tuesday, much to my kids' delight.  After reducing, I sieved the stock into a jar and the glistening, liquidy-gold chicken fat separated to the surface.  Once chilled, I scraped off the layer of schmaltz, mixed in some thyme, and set it aside for topping oysters. 

Virgin Coconut Oil & Lemon Balm

I know.  It sounds more like a skincare product than grilled oyster topping.  However, there's a movement known as ostroveganism or bivalveganism, and I wanted to make a charcoal oyster that met this criteria.  The idea is that some bivalves, like mussels, clams, and oysters, don't have central nervous systems, and therefore are neither sentient nor feel pain, satisfying one of the primary tenets of veganism.  Sure, they feed, react to stimuli, even move in some instances.  However, there's a growing subset of vegans that argue this is more akin to a plant's existence than an animal's.  There are also supporting considerations around the health benefits of oysters, as well as their positive environmental impact.  The concept has been around since the '70s, but it's caught fire over the last decade.  There's even a self-proclaimed vegan & vegetarian restaurant in DC that serves an oyster course.  Dietary practices are profoundly personal, so whatever makes people happy is ok in my book.  To make this ostrovegan charcoal oyster, the most flavorful plant-based fat I could think of was virgin coconut oil.  I lightly warmed a little on the stove, added some fresh tamarind and lemon balm, and set it aside for topping oysters. 

L to R: Chorizo, Schmaltz, Bone Marrow, Coconut Oil

With all four flavorful fats ready to go, I fired up the charcoal and started shucking away on a sunny Saturday afternoon.  The funny thing about the Wellfleet oysters I'd got from Hill's Quality Seafood is that they were all perfect.  Rich, plump, and tasty; not your typical summer oysters.  Don't worry, I enjoyed a few raw before prepping a dozen for the grill.  With charcoal oysters, there's one simple rule - do not overcook them!  As soon as the liquor bubbles and the oysters start to curl at the edges, they're done.  Just a few minutes to incorporate all the toppings but not lose the natural juicy and snappy texture of fresh oysters.  Another tricky thing about cooking oysters over charcoal is their concave, oddly shaped bottom shells.  When placed on a grill grate, some will always tilt or list, leading to oyster liquor and fats spilling over the sides onto the coals.  Many chefs roast or oven-broil their oysters on a bed of rock salt for this very reason.  However, even if you lose a little bit of flavorful liquid, each one of those drips leads to an aromatic flame up.  The oysters really aren't on the grill long enough to impart a ton of charcoal flavor, so I welcome each little smokey kiss they can get.     

Starting at 12 o'clock and going clockwise:
Schmaltz, Chorizo, Coconut Oil, Bone Marrow

After a few minutes over the coals, I had my dozen charcoal oysters ready to go.  The chorizo & cilantro topped with pickled jalapeño was great, as I'd expected.  I added a little pickled garlic to the bone marrow & parsley to cut through the richness, which also turned out great.  The ostrovegan coconut oil & lemon balm definitely surprised, though.  The tamarind became a little too tacky, but that blooming aroma of coconut oil is tough to beat, especially when finished with a fresh red chile.  It felt like I was taking a bite of a grilled seafood feast on a beach in the Bahamas.  However, hands down, the schmaltz & thyme was the best, blowing the other three out of the water.  Topped with some brunoised nectarine, because summer stone fruit is amazing, it was the perfect balance of briny, sweet, slightly acidic, and deeply savory.  I wasn't terribly surprised.  Like I said, put chicken fat on anything and it's going to taste great.

Chargrilled, charbroiled, grilled, barbecued, or whatever you want to call them, oysters over charcoal are shuckin' delicious.  I hope y'all have a wonderful summer and get more than a few chances to throw some seafood on the grill.  Just don't forget the schmaltz. 

 

Cheers,

The SF Oyster Nerd