Oyster Beer - Are You Kidding Me?

Oyster farming links Va. company with Annapolis

War Shore recently teamed up with the Alexandria, Va.-based Port City Brewing Company to create to produce a special edition beer which will be available in April. A portion of the proceeds from the Revival Stout -- made by steeping oyster shells in the brewing water -- will go toward the Oyster Recovery Partnership. Located in Annapolis, the organ-ization aims to revive the bay's oyster population.

I found this embedded in the article about how an Annapolis restaurant and the Virginia based growers to provide salty and local oysters to the restaurant.  Frankly, having been near a large heap of oyster shells rotting in the sun in Marylands summer swelter, I can't imagine that it would make a very good beer.  But if she brought it, I'd try it... 

Another article touts how "microbrands" of oysters are springing up in the Chesapeake Bay:

"I'd guess there's 50 branded oysters; it's growing exponentially" in Virginia, said Travis Croxton, a fourth-generation owner of Rappahannock River Oysters in Tappahannock.

The Chesapeake Bay now yields Cherrystones, Shooting Points, Painters Creeks, Yorksters, Nassawaddox Salts, Choptank Sweets, Barcats, Old Plantations and more.

The Lynnhaven River is home to Church Points, Witch Ducks and Ludford's Pleasure House oysters. More are in the works.

"It's not any different than what was happening in the 1970s with California wines," said Daniel Kauffman, a Virginia Tech seafood business specialist who in January led a daylong half-shell marketing workshop to a standing-room-only audience.

The names, growers say, are critical to cultivating the new breed of half-shell customers — chefs, raw-bar owners and diners with an intense interest in the origin of their oysters and who appreciate nuances in flavor the way oenophiles appreciate fine wine.

Certainly, oysters from different regions can have a different taste.  Salt content is obviously important; people generally favor saltier oysters, but in addition, when you eat an oyster, you're eating somewhat digested oyster food, which is primarily suspended algae, and that can taste different depending on the kind of algae growing in a particular place at a particular time.  And oyster condition ("fatness") varies seasonally, with the fattest oysters, rich in yolk material, in spring.

Jake Finnegan picked this up in Burqalesque Babes: Ava Aston.