Oysters At Home Part 1

Did Wednesday's article about the Stranraer Oyster Festival tickle your taste buds? Let me pose a few questions.

Dear readers-

1. How many of you like oysters?
2. How many consume them regularly, say once a month or more? and
3. How many of you have ever prepared them at home?

Now if you say you don't like them, but have never tried them, you have no right to call yourself a reader of Tom Cooks! For shame. Promise me you'll give one a shot when the native season starts.

So you like them, but don't eat them regularly. I'm hardly surprised, given the cost. I looked at some Edinburgh menus. Fishers in the City and Whighams charge £21 for 6; Dulse and the Mussel & Steak Bar £22. At Roy Brett's Ondine in St Andrews, prices start at £29 for 6. That's even pricier than Richard Corrigan's Bentley's in Piccadilly, which takes a bit of doing.

In other words, a lot of money for a starter. Well, eating good steak in a restaurant is also for a special occasion, so you probably cook your own. So here's a challenge for you. Why not have your own oysters at home? Ah, you don't know how.

No shame in that, but surely we readers of Tom Cooks! are always keen to increase our skill sets? Remember the first time you jointed a chicken? Now easy peasy. Or segmented an orange? I thought it impossible first time I tried. Skinning a piece of fish, or preparing a whole one? The former is simple. I'm still not great at the latter unless it's something easy like trout, but I can do it after a fashion. You get the point.

You really do need a proper oyster knife. Don't use an ordinary kitchen knife as you'll break it. I see a decent looking selection on Amazon starting at £6.49. Make sure you buy one with a guard. Amazon will try to sell you kits with gloves. No need if you follow the advice below.

I found an excellent YouTube video showing you how to shuck (open) an oyster easily and safely. Find the link at https://bit.ly/4n54h3k. Most books will tell you simply to use a cloth to protect your hand. Here you'll find excellent advice on how to use a cloth both for protection and for holding the oyster steady.

So why not give it a try? The average fishmonger who sells them will open them for you, but you may well lose the liquor, the glorious fishy brine which adds so much to the experience. Researching this article I spoke to my pal Campbell Mickel, chef extraordinaire, now proprietor of the famous Eddies Seafood Market in Edinburgh's Marchmont. Campbell is no average fishmonger.

I noted that Loch Fyne Oysters will sell you a dozen Rock oysters for £15. Campbell tells me that in his experience these are fairly small specimens, probably around the 70g mark. When the season starts Eddies will be selling large Cumbrae oysters at around the same price: the difference is that these will be around 125g. He will add the princely sum of 10p for opening your mollusc. Another option is that Campbell will, if you wish, break the hinge and release the top abductor muscle. He'll serve them in a shallow tray on ice, thus allowing you to retain all the liquor till you get home. All you have to do is to slide a knife underneath to release the meat from the shell.

The best of all worlds, but I challenge you to buy a couple whole and try shucking for yourself. I made it without injury, though there were a few flakes of shell to contend with. Anyway, you now have your opened oyster. (Call yourself a shucker if you wish. I've been called worse.) Now what to do with it?

For serving and eating raw, release the oyster from the shell and reverse it. To be truthful, I'm not sure why. To preserve the liquor you need to keep the shell upright when serving them. Crushed ice is ideal, but coarse salt works. I'm assuming you don't have a special tray for serving oysters? You know that thing you bought when on holiday in France and is gathering dust somewhere. You probably can't find it anyway.

And with what shall I serve it, dear Lisa? For some inexplicable reason, the most common accompaniment is something called mignonette. Mignon in French means lovely or adorable. So why the **** is a combo of shallots and red wine vinegar named a small lovely or adorable thing? Basically you mix very finely chopped shallots with red wine vinegar. Refrigerate for a couple of days, then throw it away, or use it for a salad dressing. UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES put it anywhere near a good quality oyster.

How would I eat it? A squeeze of lemon is all that's required, one drop of Tabasco if you must. I have no strong views on whether you swallow it whole or chew it. I'm a chewer. Thinly sliced brown bread with or without a scraping of butter is good too. Traditionally you would drink Chablis, but there are two problems. Firstly, good Chablis is an eyewatering price these days (and don't touch the cheap stuff with a bargepole). Secondly, wine merchant Stuart Easton from Luvians Bottle Shop in Cupar tells me that Chablis is being affected by global warming. Climate change means that you rarely get that steely, minerally edge which was the perfect accompaniment to oysters. I'd go for a well chilled top range Muscadet.

Happy shucking, slurping and sipping.

Tom Cooks! will return in October