Salt Pond Oysters

Oyster Fest – Hememways restaurant – Providence, RI

admin — Thu, 16 Sep 2010 20:27:35 +0000

Come join us at Hemenways restaurant on Sept 18th from 12-5pm. Admission is free and all proceeds to benefit the jimmy fund.

Join us at the B and G oyster Festival May 2nd

admin — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 15:04:47 +0000

There’s only 200 tickets available and they’re selling fast! The 2nd annual oyster fest in boston to benefit the food project. Doors open at noon. We’ll be shucking Rhode Islands best oysters, Salt Pond Selects, all day long. Come join the fun and help out a great cause.

Local oyster farms host Toy Drive

admin — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 13:40:34 +0000

This coming Saturday and Sunday (dec. 19th,20th) at the Matunuck Oyster Bar, 8 different oyster farms from Rhode Island doanted oysters and will be giving out 1 dozen oysters in exchange for 1 unwrapped toy. Non perishable food items and checks made out to RICAN (Rhode Island Center Assisting those in Need) will also be collected. A free oyster knife will be given out with each bag of 1 dozen oysters, and chowder will also be served. Come join us from 9am-4pm all weekend long!

Intrusive government is the FDA’s oyster

admin — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 14:26:02 +0000

Intrusive government is the FDA’s oyster

By David Freddoso

Commentary Staff Writer

The Washington Examiner

October 29, 2009

URL: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/FDA-kill-your-oyster-67243097.html

How much damage can government do, how much fun can it destroy, and how much freedom can it take away in the name of public health and safety? We might find out in April 2011, when a new Food and Drug Administration rule on Gulf of Mexico oysters goes into effect.

In order to prevent an extremely rare disease that affects 30 American oyster-eaters each year, the FDA will require that Gulf oysters harvested between April and October of every year be put through expensive [postharvest treatment] processes that destroy their flavor and essentially preclude their being served raw.

Vibro vulnificus [vibriosis] is a deadly but extremely rare bacterial infection that affects oysters in warm waters. It kills about 15 Gulf oyster-eaters each year, nationwide. Each time you eat one serving of oysters from the Gulf of Mexico, your risk is a bit less than one-in-a-million of contracting V. vulnificus, according to the Molluscan Shellfish Institute. Your chances of dying from it are half that.

For perspective, you are four times more likely to be struck by lightning. You are 100 times more likely to die in a car accident.

But that actually overstates the real risk, because your chances of getting V. vulnificus [vibriosis] from an oyster are much smaller if you are not already immuno-compromised — i.e., you don’t have AIDS, diabetes, hepatitis, or liver damage from excessive drinking [cirrhosis]. These conditions account for most reported cases of V. vulnificus [vibriosis], and for nearly every death it has caused.

In its zeal to protect everyone from harm, the FDA does not think it sufficient to require special warnings for those at risk. Michael Taylor, senior advisor to FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg, explained in a recent speech that it is just too difficult to make these populations listen.

Moreover, less intrusive measures have failed to achieve FDA’s goal of reducing V. vulnificus [vibriosis] cases by 60 percent. As Taylor put it, “[w]e no longer believe that measures which reduce the hazard, but fall well short of eliminating it, such as improvements in refrigeration, are sufficient…”

Instead, FDA will ruin Gulf oysters for everyone, and in the process perhaps double or even triple the cost of all oysters. As they said in Viet Nam, they have to destroy the village in order to save it.

The newly required processes will not only cost millions, but they also affect oyster quality, according to Bart Farrell, an oyster expert with the Clyde’s restaurant chain. Clyde’s runs The Old Ebbitt, home to the afternoon oyster happy hour and a famous hangout for anyone who’s anyone in Washington. Farrell explained that the newly required post-harvesting process — which include low-dose radiation, high pressure, or quick-freezing — changes the taste of oysters noticeably. “By the time you’re done, the oyster has absolutely no flavor,” he said.

The Old Ebbitt does not serve raw oysters from the Gulf, but Farrell said that he expects the price of all oysters to skyrocket once the new regulations go into effect, just as it did in the weeks after Hurricane Katrina. “It’s going to put a lot of people out of work,” he said.

In the short run, a spike in oyster prices will be good news for Tom Gallivan, an oyster farmer in Virginia whose product will not be directly affected. But Gallivan told me he is not celebrating.

“We’re very concerned,” said Gallivan. “I don’t think we see it as a market advantage, because eventually there’s a lot of potential that they will come for us.” If the FDA chooses to crack down on the more common but less deadly V. parahaemolyticus bacterium, which can cause severe vomiting and diarrhea for up to ten days, it could affect oysters harvested as far north as New Hampshire, he said.

“I think the FDA is being a bit heavy-handed,” said Gallivan. ”Probably more people perish in traffic fatalities driving to and from oyster bars than die eating the oysters.”

The government has yet to ban automobiles or cigarettes, two conveniences known to be mass-killers. But in 17 months, the FDA will nearly shut down a multi-million dollar industry, put thousands out of work, and bar millions from their passion for oysters — all because a handful of people died who should not have been eating raw food in the first place.

RI – New regs to limit aquaculture

admin — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 22:16:21 +0000

http://pbn.com/detail.html?sub_id=9871f164ed9a&page=1

In the last few years, there has been a growing concern in Rhode Island about the expansion of oyster farms. Some people have expressed their need for a “plan for aquaculture”, especially in Rhode Islands coastal ponds.
A group has come up with a plan, limiting each body of water in the state, to a maximum 5% aquaculture by acreage. This nice round number was chosen claiming that the carrying capacity (maximum numbers of animals or biomass that can be supported by a given ecosystem for a given time) of shellfish in a given body of water, if at 5% or less, would not negatively affect the surrounding environment.

Shellfish aquaculture is great for the environment when shellfish, especially oysters, filter thousands of pounds of nitrogen from the water. Oyster farms create many jobs, and there are presently 30 farms in RI.
In a world where the need for jobs, food, and a healthier environment exist, a cap has been created to limit the amount of area and therefore production of what many people believe to be the tastiest shellfish in the world.

Latest ECSGA newsletter…..

admin — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 17:55:37 +0000

The East Coast Shellfish Growers Association provides us with a quarterly newsletter filled with information and random news from the oyster world.

http://www.ecsga.org/pages/Newsletters/NewsletterV2-09.htm

New gem in South County, RI

admin — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 21:15:48 +0000

The newly opened Matunuck Oyster Bar, owned by Perry Raso, is packed on a daily basis for good reason. There are many local Rhode Island oysters on the menu, a full bar including BBC microbrews, any type of wine desired, and an outdoor patio to sit down, relax and enjoy a beautiful sunset over Potter Pond. From 4-6pm the matunuck oyster bar offers $1.00 Matunuck oysters, farm raised right around the corner from its waterfront dining area. A delicious full menu with local fresh fish from Pt. Judith and produce from local Rhode Island farms.

http://www.ricentral.com/content/view/180479/236/

Milford Oyster Festival

admin — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 15:58:13 +0000

Started in 1975, the Annual Milford Oyster Festival is held on the third Saturday of August every year and attracts local residents and visitors from around the globe who want to enjoy the sights, sounds, tastes and history of Milford, Connecticut at a family-oriented festival. 2009 marks the 35th Annual Milford Oyster Festival. Our festival has grown from a tiny local one-day celebration of the oyster and our wonderful seaside community into one of Connecticut’s summer highlights. Festival planning is a year-round project for a hand full of volunteers who organize the event. Festival visitors have a choice of activities including entertainment for children and music fans, harbor canoe and kayak races, over 200 arts and crafts vendors from around the country, a classic car show and tremendous food offered by local non-profit civic organizations. The festival provides the venue for many non-profit organizations to raise money for each of their causes. Also, enjoy many different oysters from Rhode Island oyster farms including Salt Pond Oysters and a varitey of other oysters from all over New England!

www.milfordoysterfestival.org

The Best Kept Secret

admin — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 12:34:52 +0000

The best-kept secret in oysters right now has got to be Salt Pond Selects, raised by Dave Roebuck in Point Judith Pond, Rhode Island. I tried them for the first time last June and was blown away. Here’s what I wrote:

“Another heavyweight from Point Judith Pond, Rhode Island, Salt Ponds are oyster-lover’s oysters: big, bountiful, and intensely flavorful. If you made a demi-glace with seawater, you’d approximate the concentrated tidepool brine of a Salt Ponds. They are unusually metallic for a virginica, with hints of the iron and petrol flavors found in Point Judith Pond oysters. These 2.5-year-old oysters are very large, heavy, and strong. The shells—bronze and black-striped on top, a lovely white-green on the bottom—shuck smoothly every time, yielding a rich meat that will take you back to childhood days of lazing around the New England shore.”

I recently tried them again and they were even better–everything I wrote above, but bigger and sweeter. These monster three-year-olds make you want to laugh at the little girlie-oysters served up in so many rawbars. Dave Roebuck has a spiffy new website, so now you can direct-order Salt Pond Selects and use them to amaze and scare your friends.

Review from Rowan Jacobsen- Author of “The Oyster Guide”

admin — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 15:18:20 +0000

“A heavyweight from Point Judith Pond, Rhode Island, Salt Pond Selects are oyster-lover’s oysters: big, bountiful, and intensely flavorful. If you made a demi-glace with seawater, you’d approximate the concentrated tide pool brine of a Salt Pond Select. They are unusually metallic for a virginica, with hints of the iron and petrol flavors found in Point Judith Pond oysters. These 2.5-year-old oysters are very large, heavy, and strong. The shells-bronze and black-striped on top, a lovely white-green on the bottom-shuck smoothly every time, yielding a rich meat that will take you back to childhood days of lazing around the New England shore.”

- Rowan Jacobsen
- Author of “The Oyster Guide”