Magic Hat Stories

Exit 1 Bayshore Oyster Stout Thanks to the Oyster Restoration Project

I'll admit it, I'm just love a story like this. As I have written in a number of posts, Slow Foods USA has their Arc of Taste which is a catalogue of endangered native foods in the USA. Included on that list is the Delaware Bay Oyster;

For 200 years, Delaware Bay oysters have been prized for their fine flavor and plump, firm meat.  In their heyday, during the late 19th century, schooners and oystermen harvested the bivalves for local oyster houses and also for restaurants in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Chicago, St. Louis and San Francisco.

It was a thriving industry, and let's face it Bivalve, NJ just didn't pick their name out of a hat. The industry fell on some hard times due to a couple of reasons;

For centuries, oysters have provided a sustainable food supply and contributed to the economies of Delaware and New Jersey communities. In fact, 1 to 2 million bushels were harvested every year during the 1930s, when the population initially began to decline. The introduction of the oyster disease MSX in the 1950s, followed in the 1990s by a second disease, Dermo, has resulted in a significant decline in the oyster population. Consequently, the industry has been imperiled.

Thanks to the Delaware Bay Restoration Project though, the Delaware Bay Oyster is on it's way back; 

During the summer of 2005, the Delaware Bay Oyster Restoration Task Force initiated a large-scale oyster shell-planting and transplant program that, by 2009, had deposited over 2.1 million bushels of shell onto existing oyster reefs. These "seed beds" are needed because oyster larvae require a clean, hard surface upon which they can attach or "recruit." This effort has yielded a substantial increase in survival among juveniles; this, despite a population decline in areas outside the seed beds.

The success of this project has earned it a 2008 Coastal America Partnership Award, a 2009 gold medal from the Federal Executive Board, and a 2008 Government Award from the Water Resources Association of the Delaware River Basin .

And now Flying Fish Brewery is using the Delaware Bay Oyster in it's Exit 1 Bayshore Oyster Stout. Flying Fish is a New Jersey based craft brewery, and for those who don't know, it's been a long running running joke here in NJ citing the exit off the NJ Turnpike that your from, and not so much the town.

It's great to see this. It's local, it's sustainable and it's all based on a local tradition and lifestyle that endured for some many years. The story can continue now, along with the heritage that inspired a town to name itself Bivalve. What a shame it would be to have this town become the home of some cheesy outlet mall with a caricature of a oyster as it's logo, and a Long John Silver selling some canned oyster stew imported from China. 

Update on Testing Sun Chips Compostable Bag

In this post I wrote about the 100% compostable snack food bag that Sun Chips is now using for their larger bags of chips. As a composter, I was intrigued by this bag and thought I would throw it into the pile and see what happens.

Well a month later the bag looks pretty much the same, however there is something going on as it appears that the film is separating that makes up the layers in the wrap that compose this bag. It hasn't been hot enough yet here to get a good cooking temperature going, so I think the progress so far is good. It should take approximately 14 weeks for it to compost completely. Sorry I have no photos. I plugged the camera battery charger in to charge my battery, and it fell out of the socket after I walked away. Hence the battery was not charged when I was working on the compost pile.

If you would like more information about Nature Work LLC, the company that manufacturers the film used in these bags, click here. If you would like more information about this bag, you can go here. They have a lot of good information on the site.