Re: Pacific Oysters! Yikes!

The "Willapoints" you reference are I expect from Willapay Bay in SW Washington state and are for the most part harvested within a mile or so of where I'm sitting right now. They are fantastic, fresh and clean tasting. I've had oysters from a lot of different areas and they all seem to have a distinct taste with some of the better ones coming from Morro Bay and Tamales Bay in CA. Anyway, having eaten my share over the years I've never seen one with flippers and do-dads attached. Sounds an awful lot like squid to me, which are also delicious!

Frenchy wrote:
"Stark" <sraven@xxxxxxx> wrote in message news:251120050802540387%sraven@xxxxxxxxxx
: Okay, I don't get around much--in the kitchen or elsewhere. Since there
: were no Gulf oysters--all I've ever known--for our cornbread dressing
: this year, I picked up a couple of half pints of Pacific Oysters that
: my Kroger store had trucked in.
:
: Ye Gods! These thangs were huge, about three in a half pint, with all
: sorts of flippers and do-dads still attached. Do you ever face them in
: an oyster bar? You'd need a knife and fork.
:
: We cut 'em up and plopped them in our dressing and they were great, but
: I'm sill amazed by the size, . . and the configuration.
:
: These were called Willapoints, I believe; if they are what West
: Coasters are used to, they must think puny little Gulf Oysters are a
: waste of good shell. As I recall those flippers and do-dads did sort
: of disappear in the dressing. Maybe Gulf oysters retain a little more
: integrity.

Reminds me of my first meeting with those suckers, in 1973. Driving down I5 California we stopped for dinner at a cute restaurant whose menu specified you could have oysters anyway you wanted. Now I am from New Zealand where Bluff Oysters are considered the world's best, closely rivalled by Sydney, who think their Rock Oysters are better! Most seafood restaurants here would offer those as a dozen raw as an appetiser, So I asked, in 1973, for half a dozen raw Willapoints. The waitress blanched and said no-one eats a half dozen and seemed also to indicate that no-one ate them raw. I insisted I was a "real Southern Man" and we eat dozens of oysters raw at a sitting. She still said I couldn't do it and she would only serve me one. By this time I was suspicious! My SO was egging me on to try it, so with great ceremony the waitress brought a single one of these creatures out on a plate. Its got bigger over the years of telling the story, but I swear this thing stretched from one side of the plate to the other. I manfully got it down and thanked the waitress profusely for not allowing me more!!

Frenchy


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