http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/22/dining/22oyst.html

February 22, 2006

At Lunch With Mark Kurlansky

A New York Story on the Half Shell

By FLORENCE FABRICANT

"Before it had hot dogs or bagels, New York had oysters. And, as Mark
Kurlansky explains in "The Big Oyster: History on the Half Shell"
(Ballantine Books, $23.95), these were not just any oysters.

For more than a century, the oysters pulled from New York waters, especially
from the East River and around Staten Island, were prized by connoisseurs as
the finest in the world. They were shipped to top restaurants in Paris and
London, and once the Erie Canal was completed in 1825 and railroad links
were established soon after, they were sent to western destinations in the
expanding territory of the United States.

Demand would soon outstrip supply, and the beds were exhausted. Pollution
eventually took its toll, and what oysters were left in New York waters were
no longer safe to eat. The Big Oyster became the Big Apple.

In a previous book, "Cod: A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World"
(Walker & Company, 1997), Mr. Kurlansky examined the history of cod as a
paradigm for the depletion of the oceans. Now he is using New York's oysters
to illustrate not just overfishing but the consequences of urbanization and
the pollution that goes with it.

"Examining the oyster is an accessible way to take on the issue of urban
development," Mr. Kurlansky, 57, said. "Even though I'm from New England, I
never wanted to eat cod that much. Oysters are much better."

As he was talking about oysters last week, he was making short work of an
assorted dozen on the half shell - none from New York - at Aquagrill in
SoHo, slurping the bivalves from their shells without the benefit of
silverware or sauces. When it comes to oysters on a personal level, Mr.
Kurlansky is a purist. His book, which will be available next week, does not
even mention cocktail sauce. "There are lots of things in this book that I
wouldn't do to an oyster, like roasting them," he said, adding that he also
likes clams. "But clams don't have the same taste of the sea as oysters, and
none of the romance and wildness."

A native of Hartford who now lives in Manhattan, he went to Butler
University in Indianapolis, where he was a theater major.

"I wanted college to be a real American adventure for me," he said. He tried
writing plays but, dissatisfied with his progress, went into journalism. He
said he always had an interest in food. "When you're in theater you
inevitably wind up working in restaurants," he said. "I made pastry."

Even before writing a book on cod, he had written food articles for various
publications. The oyster book grew out of an article he wrote for The New
York Times's City section in 2001. His next book, a nonfood volume called
"Nonviolence: 25 Lessons From the History of a Dangerous Idea," is scheduled
to be published in October by Modern Library. Then he will start work on a
book of the food writings commissioned before World War II for the Works
Progress Administration.

Through the oyster, Mr. Kurlansky's current book traces the social, economic
and environmental history of New York City and its waterways, starting even
before the Europeans came on the scene, with the oyster-loving Lenape
Indians. From the shells in the middens, or refuse heaps, archaeologists
have concluded that the Lenape ate tons of oysters. With the Dutch, then the
English and eventually every other group that arrived, the abundant oysters
in the harbor and the rivers contributed to the city's economy.

The Dutch did just fine shipping oysters to Europe, though they were
disappointed that the city's oysters could not revive their pearl industry -
they are the ones who named Pearl Street - but Eastern American oysters,
Crassostrea virginica, do not make gem-quality pearls. All the native
oysters on the East Coast, from Louisiana to Newfoundland, are C. virginica,
a different species from many West Coast varieties and from European
oysters.

Mr. Kurlansky's book explains oyster taxonomy, biology and history, and not
just as these subjects relate to New York.

He marvels at the human taste for oysters. "They take work, and they are not
terribly nutritious," he said. "And a hundred or more years ago oysters were
a food that was consumed in more or less the same form by every social
class. Throughout most of New York's history, oysters were incredibly cheap.
You could get all you could eat for 6 cents, an entire plate for less than
what a hot dog cost, at a time when a single out-of-season strawberry cost
50 cents."

Mr. Kurlansky was particularly struck by the extent to which New York was
identified by oysters at that time.

"People came here to eat them, like having grilled sardines in Portugal," he
said. "Europeans loved the taste of them. As with wine, geography affects
the flavor. Oysters are usually named for a locale."

Mr. Kurlansky's book also documents the ways people liked to eat oysters.
Some recipes, mostly from 19th-century cookbooks, are included "for their
historic interest," he said. A few of them are worth trying.

Cooking oysters on grills or in stews was the norm until the middle of the
19th century, when fancy restaurants, following French tastes, started
serving them raw. It was not just Diamond Jim Brady and Lillian Russell who
would tuck into platters bearing dozens of oysters to start a dinner.

The hoi polloi would frequent bawdy oyster cellars, some owned by
African-Americans, where oysters were served raw and cooked, with plenty of
strong drink. And once Charles Dickens discovered them, the oyster cellars
became everyone's destination.

Around that time the story takes an ugly, polluted turn. Starting in the
mid- to late-1800's, many of New York's oyster beds, in the Harlem River,
for example, and in Jamaica Bay, were abandoned because of the pollution
from increased industrialization and improper waste disposal.

If the natural oyster beds were being wiped out, not only in New York's
harbor and rivers, but also in New Jersey and Long Island waters, oysters
could be cultivated. Spat, or small oysters, mainly from Chesapeake Bay,
were introduced. "With cultivation, the New York oyster industry thought it
had beaten nature," Mr. Kurlansky said. "But the city still didn't take care
of its water. London, where oysters once came from the Thames, has a similar
story."

He said that by the 1970's water conditions had started to improve, but it
was still too toxic to make the cultivation of oysters, which constantly
filter water through their bodies, safe in New York Harbor. As he was
finishing the last of the oysters on his plate at lunch, Mr. Kurlansky
paused. "I only wish I could taste a real New York oyster," he said. "But
that's impossible."



Copyright 2006The New York Times Company