TableSep – Mar

Oyster Opening

Wild natives, not farmed

Sweden's oysters are the flat native, Ostrea edulis, and the beds on the Bohuslän coast are wild rather than farmed. That is unusual in Europe now, and it is why they taste of somewhere specific — metallic, mineral, and far less sweet than the rock oysters most people have met.

They are picked by hand, by divers, one at a time. There is no dredge and no rope, which caps the supply at whatever a person can carry and explains the price.

You go out with somebody who does that work, and then you learn to open them, which is a knack rather than a strength and takes about twenty attempts to stop being dangerous.

The months with an R in them

The old rule about months with an R in them has a real basis: oysters spawn in warm water and are thin and milky afterwards. September to March is when they are worth eating, and midwinter is when they are best.

Which means this is a cold-weather thing done in a boat, and dressing for it matters more than it sounds.

Eaten on the rocks with nothing on them, or with a spoonful of something sharp if you must. There will be an argument about that, and both sides will be represented.

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