CRAIG CLAIBORNE

On our Aegean sojourn I have been totally immersed in a book written by Thomas McNamee .. "The Man Who Changed The Way We Eat" .. on the life of one Craig Claiborne - Food Critic Extraordinaire from the 50s to 70s in America. What captivated me was Claiborne's personality, his plain genius, his illustrious career, his eccentricity, his irreverence, his flair, but above all the style of his penmanship which shaved my naive aspirations to write about food and eating to a mere crew cut, if that.

From being the Food Editor at the New York Times he later started the Craig Claiborne Journal and from what follows you will see what I mean.

"When you are ready to dine, and not a moment earlier, open your favorite oysters - only the fattest and fleshiest ones to be sure - and make sure that each is still alive by exploring its reflexes. This is quite simple - simply touch the edge of the lamella (muscle on the edge) and if it does not retract, the oyster has expired.  Remove the living creature from its shell, in the most delicate manner possible - and bring it immediately to your mouth with no extraneous trimmings whatsoever and in a trice, with your teeth, perforate its liver. If it is an oyster of proper freshness and quality, the whole of your gums will soak in it, your mouth will be filled with its juices, the true criterion of an oyster that has reached its peak.

You should rest for a moment in that state, then slowly swallow the juices and finish off the mastication and deglutition (the action and process of swallowing) of the mollusk. After that, invigorate yourself with a mouthful of good, dry white wine, munch a piece of  black or white bread, buttered or not, to solely neutralize the tongue in order to savor to the fullest the oyster to follow .."

Now, have you ever read of even heard of eating an oyster, or for that matter eating anything, being presented in such a vivid, poetic manner?