Who doesn’t covet a raw oyster?

Me.

So far I’ve only written about foods I love, or at least like: good sandwiches, pizza, biscuits, chocolate cream pie, popovers, chocolate bread pudding, pretty much anything fried, pretty much anything fattening.

Remember the split seam last week?

This week I’m going to change it up a little and talk about something I don’t like, but almost everybody I know and love does. Raw oysters.

Don’t start hyperventilating. I’m not saying raw oysters are gross, just that I, personally, don’t like them.

It’s hard for me to resist eating something that looks enticing, even when I’m not hungry, when placed within reach.

A plate of raw oysters doesn’t entice me. Place a plate of them in front of me, and I’ll say thanks, but I’ll pass. Unless I’ve had a couple beers or glasses of wine, or a martini, or a manhattan. Or if I don’t want to hurt the oyster-giver’s feelings.

Believe it or not I’m really a very kind-hearted person. I don’t like hurting someone’s feelings, unless she/he has given me reason to. If you have ever been mean to me or someone I love, you don’t want to offer me a raw oyster.

I don’t know if oysters have always been as popular as they are now, but I know Hemingway had a weakness for them, and there been countless references to them in literature over the years.

I used to love watching my father eat them. I still love watching people eat them.

But come on. They’re slimy and mucilaginous. (Merriam-Webster’s definition of mucilaginous: sticky, viscid; of, relating to, full of, or secreting mucilage. In case you didn’t know.)

I just don’t get the appeal. I love the ocean and the icy cold salt water that oyster lovers claim is the essence of the oyster.

I spoke with oyster aficionados Ralph and Elena Smith at their restaurant, The World is Mine Oyster. Ralph, who sells a LOT of oysters, says he can tell where an oyster was raised by the flavor of the brine.

“If you put a plate in front of me with six different species of oysters, I could tell you where each one came from. The oysters taste different depending on where they grew — the salinity and depth of the water, what they’ve eaten, how old they are, all flavor the oysters.”

Elena Smith said it’s an acquired taste. “It’s like wine. You learn the terroir, you learn the land where they come from, and you start tasting the difference.”

I also talked to marine biologist Jon Lewis, who says he’s not an aficionado, but has been involved in oyster farming in some capacity for the past 19 years. He farms his own oysters for himself and his wife, Sue. He’s a great cook, and is always dreaming up a new way to cook the bivalves. I probably shouldn’t admit this, but I never knew bivalve meant having two hinged shells. I knew oysters, clams, scallops and mussels were bivalves, but I always thought it had something to do with, well, valves. Learn something new every day.

I learned from Lewis that oyster farmers actually “plant” oyster, or virginica, seeds — just like planting a vegetable seed, only different. The seeds are planted in briny rivers, on the bottom or in bags or traps. It takes three years for an oyster to mature to edible size. And the further south oysters are farmed, the faster they get big enough to eat. It’s all about water temperature, current and food source.

Anyway, among those three I learned pretty much everything I’ve ever wanted, or not wanted, to know about oysters. It’s all very interesting but unfortunately not enough to make me want to slurp one of those mucilaginous things out of its shell and into my mouth. For one thing they’re still alive when you eat them. I have an issue with eating something alive.

It’s a good thing they don’t have eyeballs. But guess what Elena Smith told me. At one point in their short briny existence they did. That really did it for me.

Joe Williamson, of McSeagulls and Tufulio’s (Sugarloaf) fame, came up with an oyster recipe he called Oysters Tufulio. They were served on the half shell with a little dollop of cocktail sauce, a small piece of each provolone and bacon and roasted for a minute or two. Believe it or not you could still taste that oyster underneath all those flavors.

Joe was a great cook. He was a great charmer, too, unfortunately for me. You can read about him in my autobiography. This is a family newspaper.

I’ll tell you all about the time Joe and I drove to California in a Volkswagen bus, picked up his partner, Larry Sullivan, in San Francisco, and drove up Route One along the coast to Mendocino. We stopped at some joint along the way that specialized in barbecued oysters. We ate a lot of them, and washed them down with a lot of beer. By the time we got to Mendocino, I was down for the count. Checked in to a lovely room in a bed & breakfast overlooking the Pacific, and passed out. That was a bummer.

The World is Mine Oyster serves cooked oysters too. One of them, Buffalo fried oysters, sounds yummy: Glidden Point Select oysters, deep-fried and tossed in a hot sauce, served in the shell with blue cheese. And oysters Rockefeller: a baked oyster with creamed spinach and bacon, flambéed with a licorice liqueur. “That gives it that New Orleans punch,” Ralph said.

Smith said he sells way more raw oysters than cooked though. “Ten to one.” Go figure. He said they’ll go through 4,000 oysters on a really good day, on average they’ll sell 1,200 to 1,500 a day.

Raw oysters: People either love them or hate them. As for the physiological benefits of ingesting an oyster, it’s not enough to sway me. I have never found proof that they have any impact on sex drive, but they do deliver some protein and are rich in vitamins C and B-12. And they’re loaded with zinc.

Zinc is great for knocking a cold out of your system. Of course, you could just suck on a Cold-Eeze tablet. Mainly zinc, it’ll kill a cold in no time flat, and it’s not mucilaginous.

See ya next week.

I’m not a chef. I lay no claim to being an authority on food or cooking. I’m a good cook, and a lover of good food. And I know how to spell and put a sentence together. This column is simply meant to be fun, and hopefully inspiring. So to anyone reading this whose hackles are raised because you know more about the subject of food than I, relax. I believe you. Email me at suzithayer@boothbayregister.com.