Field Trip

While I wouldn’t normally walk around in shoes covered with oyster shells and beer, I made an exception this past weekend at the Wellfleet Oyster Fest in Cape Cod. My first visit to this festival rewarded me with an avalanche of fresh, glistening, cold, Wellfleet oysters and an unending supply of Buzzard Bay beer, live entertainment and crowds of brothers and sisters of the half shell.

This year, there was no rain, just cloudless, blue skies and fresh ocean breezes blowing over the festival. I watched a man shuck 24 oysters in 2 minutes, 3 seconds (before penalties – don’t ask); I saw dogs dressed as lobsters; and I was not surprised to have seen at least one baby dressed as an oyster.

And then there was the food. It goes without saying that the oysters in the half shell never ran out. But we also ate oyster stew, fried oysters, lobster rolls, Jamaican chicken, kettle corn, Italian pastries, hot apple cider and more. Mostly, though, we ate fresh-shucked oysters.

The going price was $12 a dozen and we made no excuses for downing plate after plate. First we tasted just the oysters, right from the shell, their salty-sweet liquor surrounding those plump morsels of ocean’s bounty. Then we squeezed just a flash of fresh lemon juice across the plate for a sweet, sour, briny combination of pleasure. Finally, we ate them with tangy, spicy cocktail sauce, washing down every other slurp with a gulp of Buzzards Bay’s excellent pilsner, lager or ale.

I’ve enjoyed oysters in the quiet of the night with Champaign. I had always thought that nothing could top that. I was wrong. Without a doubt, oysters taste just as good in the open air, surrounded by 20,000 of your closest friends, spilling beer on your shoes while dancing to live music.