A Cure for the Tuesday Blahs

Photo by Leslie Kelly

Eagle Rock oysters at Blueacre had curative powers.

The other day, I was dragging. I'm not sure if it was the relentlessly crappy weather, the state of my bank account, or the bottle of wine I'd drunk with dinner the night before, but I felt like hell.

Instead of booking a ticket to Hawaii or putting an icebag on my aching head, I took another approach, making a beeline to the Blueacre oyster bar. Seattle is blessed with many fine oyster bars, but I dig Blueacre because the bivalves are always expertly sourced and shucked. And during happy hour, they're a steal at $1 apiece.

Eating oysters around here often comes with a geography lesson. Many Pacific oysters are named for the place in which they're grown. There are so many sweet spots in the South Sound, it's tough to keep up with the various oyster names and places.

I love Hama Hama oysters, which are harvested close to Hood Canal and which you can now purchase at the U District Farmers Markets on Saturdays (yay!), and I think the Chelsea Gems grown near Olympia are aptly named. I'm wild about Barron Point oysters; and though they've been impossible to find this year, when I do spot them, I can eat dozens of Virginicas from Totten Inlet.

The new-to-me oysters I tried the other day were from Eagle Rock, near Totten Inlet. They're a "tumbled" oyster, which is a technique for shaving off the nasty bits on shells. "Goodbye, barnacles!" It makes for oysters with deeper cups that are perfectly bite-size. (Kusshis from Canada are another wonderful example of this increasingly popular technique.)

Those excellent Eagle Rock oysters perked me right up. If they came with a nutritional label, I'm sure I could have read about all the vitamins and minerals I was getting. I know oysters are high in zinc and B12 and are a great source of protein.

And they taste like a dip in a pristine, salty pool. If you've ever done a cold plunge after being in hot springs, you know what I mean. It's just the kind of jolt to the system that you might need after suffering through a Tuesday. Especially if there was a bucket on wine on your Monday-night menu.

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