The prolific workforce of director Jason Clever and producer Jackson Myers — finest identified for his or her sequence of Somm movies about trendy sommelier life — proceed to place out a gentle stream of authentic content material on their SOMM TV channel, which launched in 2019. The most recent is The Oyster Farmer, a half-hour movie that highlights small, family-owned oyster farmers from Westport, Massachusetts to Morro Bay on California’s Central Coast whereas revealing the fascinating historical past and life cycle of those shellfish.
The preliminary focus is on Kerian Fennelly, founding father of Westport Sea Farms, who left a declining lobster profession to start out farming oysters, which enhanced the maritime surroundings of the encompassing waters. As a result of they actively clear the water as they develop, oysters are a net-positive profit to the surroundings wherever they’re grown, simply one more reason to take glee in sucking them down.
“Oyster sommelier” Julie Qui discusses the vary of oysters accessible and why they’re good for you, being excessive in zinc, vitamin D, magnesium, and different important minerals. They had been integral to the colonization of the Americas, being that the oysters right here had been bigger than anybody had ever seen, and eaten in such lots that they ultimately went just about extinct in quite a few locales.
The Central Coast takes the display screen within the type of well-known Santa Barbara Channel uni diver Stephanie Mutz, whose background in biology makes her the proper trainer for these classes, resembling how the oyster “seeds” go from the scale of a grain of salt to totally edible in a couple of yr, with no feeding required. A lot of the movie options Neal Maloney, who began Morro Bay Oyster Co. in 2009, and now sells his shellfish throughout the Central Coast, together with the “Pacific Gold Reserves” that he tumbles to make the flesh sweeter and plumper.
For a proof of flavors, the digicam turns to skilled shucker Sam Baxter of Connie & Ted’s in West Hollywood. With expertise dealing with oysters of all sizes from in every single place on the planet, he opines that the East Coast variations lean towards briny whereas the West Coasters present cucumber and melon notes. He suggests stout ales with the previous and Japanese rice lagers with the latter.
The Oyster Farmer is a fast however potent exposition for this celebrity shellfish, and will provide you with loads of informational ammo the following time you’re round a dozen associates able to slurp away.
SOMM TV subscriptions are $6 a month or $50 a yr, with annual reductions usually accessible.