Oysters & Their Nutritional Value
There once was an oyster whose story I tell,
Who found that some sand had got into his shell.
It was only a grain, but it gave him great pain
For oysters have feelings although they're so plain.
Now, did he berate the harsh workings of fate
that brought him to such a deplorable state?
Did he curse at the government, cry for election,
And claim that the sea should have given him protection?
No- he said to himself as he lay on a shell,
Since I cannot remove it I shall try to improve it.
Now the years have rolled around, as the years always do.
And he came to his ultimate destiny: stew.
And the small grain of sand that had bothered him so
was a beautiful pearl all richly aglow.
Now the tale has a moral, for isn't it grand
what an oyster can do with a morsel of sand?
What couldn't we do if we'd only begin with
some of the things that get under our skin.
Written by "Anonymous"
Perhaps, people can take a lesson from this inspirational story of the oyster. They can learn that it takes more than pearls to characterize such a determined little sea creature: "The Oyster"
Oysters and Their Nutritional Value
Not everyone will eat an oyster because of it's looks. .... but oysters are not only delicious, they're also one of the most nutritionally well balanced of foods, containing protein, carbohydrates and lipids. The National Heart & Lung Institute suggest oysters as an ideal food for inclusion in low-cholesterol diets. Oysters are an excellent source of vitamins A, B1(thiamin), B2 (riboflavin), B3 (niacin), C (ascorbic acid) and D (calciferol). Four or five medium size oysters supply the recommended daily allowance of iron, copper, iodine, magnesium, calcium, zinc, manganese and phosphorus. So come on everybody...eat oysters...there good for you!
Yep there are male and female oysters but there is no way of telling male oysters from females by examining their shells. A really neat Fun Fact is,While oysters have separate sexes, they may change sex one or more times during their life span! Wow! The gonads, organs responsible for producing both eggs and sperm, surround the digestive organs and are made up of sex cells, branching tubules and connective tissue.
Oysters breathe much like fish, using both gills and mantle. The mantle is lined with many small, thin-walled blood vessels which extract oxygen from the water and expel carbon dioxide. A small, three-chambered heart, lying under the abductor muscle, pumps colorless blood, with its supply of oxygen, to all parts of the body. At the same time a pair of kidneys located on the underside of the muscle purify the blood of any waste products it has collected.
How do pearls end up inside of oysters?
An oyster produces a pearl when foreign material becomes trapped inside the shell. The oyster responds to the irritation by producing nacre, a combination of calcium and protein. The nacre coats the foreign material and over time produces a pearl. Wow! Beautiful!
There are three broad classifications: Pacific, Atlantic and Olympia. Each is further broken down to the very shore from which they are harvested. So some geography is needed:
The Pacific- Originally from Japan, the Pacific oyster is the most widely cultured oyster in the world. It's creamier than the Atlantic oyster--tasting of minerals, very oceany versus the Atlantic oyster where you can taste the saltiness of the ocean. It is sold under a variety of names, usually denoting particular peoples or growing areas.
One example is the Kumamoto. In 1568 Job Hortop set down in the Gulf of Mexico and wrote of " oysters growing on trees." The story goes that spat (baby oysters) clung in bunches to trees on the water's edge. The oysters were alternately covered in water or left high and dry, with the tide, thus encouraging them to grow well. That is why they are believed to be so small. This oyster has a buttery finish. It is known as a "beginner's oyster" because of its small size and mild taste-- and is one of the best sellers at the resto.
Another Pacific oyster is a Samish Bay with a crisp full taste with lots of meat because of its full cup. Others include Steamboats, Pearl Bay, Malaspina, Royal Myiagi, each with a different finish from very creamy to metallic to just a hint of salt or nuts.
The Atlantic- There are many varieties of Atlantic oysters, such as Malpeque, Caraquet, Blue point, Pine Island, Pugwash, etc...Each oyster has its degree of salt taste. Some customers prefer the Malpeque to a Caraquet just because it is a saltier oyster. Some like the Pine Island because it has a fruity finish, and some prefer a Pemequid because of its almond finish. [The so-called American oyster, Crassotrea Virginica Gmelin is found on America's East Coast, from the Gulf of St. Lawrence to the Gulf of Mexico as far south as Panama, and in the West Indies.]
The Olympia (Ostrea lurida)- Native to the Pacific coast, this oyster is found primarily in Washington's Puget sound. It is very small, seldom exceeding 2 inches. It has a very full flavor with a distinct aftertaste. It was a great favorite with Gold Rush San Francisco.
Kumumoto- Humboldt, California
Medium to small. Very sweet, white colored shell. Japanese style Kumumoto Oyster.
Malpeque- Long Island, New York
Watery & translucent meat, good flavor, long thin shell, red color shell.
Penn Cove- Samish Bay, Washington
Large oyster, not so as the Fanny Bays. Somewhat briny (salty) has a mild sweet after taste, rough and wavy green shell.
Ship Point- Washignton
Medium size but very meaty, good sweet flavor, similar to the Stellar Bay & Evening Core Oysters, grey smooth shell.
Stellar Bay- Deep Bay, British Columbia
Small but very meaty, well flavored taste, white light colored, hard smooth shell.
Sun Hollow- Hood Canal, Washington
Somewhat like the Hood Canal’s but a bit smaller & contains a fair amount of meat, semi sweet, rough grey shell.
Belon- Discovery Bay, Washington
Round thin oyster, European style oyster, not a lot of meat but very tasty, round thin flakey shell & red-colored.
Cortez Isle- Richmond, British Columbia
Somewhat small to small medium, nice sweet flavor, decent amount of meat, smooth bluish & gray shell.
Denman Isle- Richmond, British Columbia
Somewhat small, similar to the Cortez.
Evening Cove- Nanaimo Bay, British Columbia
Midsize, meaty, well flavored taste, white light colored, hard smooth shell.
Fanny Bay-Union Bay, British Columbia
Largest & meatiest, flavorful, but sweetness is lost in size, mainly used for Oyster Rockefeller, rough hard shell with barnacles over it.
Fanny Bay Royal Miyagi- Union Bay, British Columbia
Large shell, small amount of meat for a shell size, salty, not very flavorful, white & gray smooth shell.
Golden Mantel- Vancouver, British Columbia
Mid-sized, good meat & flavor, flaky shell, brown & dark bluish in color.
Hood Canal- Hood Canal, Washington
Midsize, medium amount of meat somewhat sweet, flakey shell colored brown & dark blue.
Oysters have, apparently, always been linked with love. When Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love, sprang forth from the sea on an oyster shell and promptly gave birth to Eros, the word "aphrodisiac" was born. Centuries later, Casanova himself would start a meal eating 12 dozen oysters--no doubt fortifying himself for the evening's pleasures.
At the same time, oysters appeared during the Triassic period--some 200 million years ago--and have been an important food source since Neolithic times. Eighteenth century British playwright John Gay speculates,
"The man sure had a palate covered o'er
With brass or steel, that on the rocky shore
First broke the oozy oyster's pearly coat,
And risked the living morsel down his throat."
The ancient Chinese raised oysters artificially, in ponds. In 320 B.C., Aristotle made a stab at how they generated, writing in his Historia Animalium that oysters came forth from slime via a process of spontaneous generation. Even at that time, Greeks served them with wine, and the Romans were so enthusiastic about these marvelous mollusks that they sent thousands of slaves to the shores of the English Channel to gather them. Roman emperors paid for them by their weight in gold.
In times past, a common rule of thumb was to eat oysters only in months that had an "R" in their name--that is, during cold weather. Happily, with modern refrigeration techniques, the danger of decay and food poisoning is nil. Today, oysters can be and are shipped and eaten year round.