For the Love of Oysters

We had quite an adventure this past Monday night when after work we boarded a bus and headed for Totten Inlet along with about 60 other people for the Walrus and Carpenter Nighttime Oyster Picnic on Taylor Farms Oyster Beds! I had first heard about this event when we first moved here in July 2010 and was thrilled when Marc stumbled across some news that the event was happening. Here’s what we saw: So this sounded fabulous albeit on a “school night”. It was going to be a late evening but what the hell, we were game for the adventure!When Marc found out on Twitter that the start time had moved from 6:30 to 7:30 I really knew Tuesday was going to be shall we say “challenging” and hoped that I wouldn’t have any major work crisis to deal with! I’m also still wondering why I never received an email about the change of time, I mean what are the odds that everyone checked freakin Twitter? I never asked how they all found out but somehow they did. So we departed from the Elliot Bay Oyster House at 7:30 and arrived at Totten Inlet around 9pm. During the ride organizer John Rowley of blog The Beautiful Taste told us about how his love for oysters began (in Paris where he was reading Hemingway’s A Moveable Feast!). John’s microphone went in and out and he was hard to hear so we missed some of the details of this romantic story – I also wish he would have explained the evening’s program to us (not the most well organized…) but we had no choice but to be game for anything. For the next 3 hours we ate oysters, drank white wine and tried to stay warm by the bonfire! Although the idea was to find oysters on the beach and even learn how to shuck them honestly they already had so many fresh oysters ready for us to eat there was no reason to even look! The beach was scattered with lantern teepees and tables with various types of oysters with lemon and/or tabasco. There were also tables with carefully selected white wines to accompany the delacasies. I wish there’d been more than one bonfire – it was cold! Apparently this is the time of year for gathering oysters and of course you must wait until the tide is out so that explains the time of night. We were lucky to have such a clear beautiful night with an almost full moon but I have to say it was still pretty dang chilly! Word to the wise, definitely dress warmly, rubber boots with thick socks a must and gloves optional – it is hard to eat oysters and drink wine with gloves on! I was happy to try a roasted oyster which was quite delicious and gave me another reason to hang out by the fire! A steaming cup of Xinh Dwelley’s legendary oyster stew and bread was served around 11:30. Just what the doctor ordered! As well as the bus which headed back to Seattle around midnight. We crawled into our bed at around 1:30 glad to be home and warm! Please sir, I want some more!!! A little rough around the edges, but a great NorthWest experience all in all!