Great Questions of Our Time

Seafood is a major preoccupation of the Menzies-Pike clan. Important portions of our communal time are devoted to the consumption and discussion of seafood. There are some points on which Family Opinion is reasonably inflexible, particularly when oysters are concerned. Taking our lead from the Elder Statesman, we concur on the following:

1. Oysters should be eaten freshly shucked and raw.
2. Lemon, salt, and white bread with butter are the only acceptable accompaniments to fresh oysters.
3. Sydney Rock Oysters are The Best Oysters in the World.
4. Pacific Oysters should be avoided at all costs.
5. Bigger is not necessarily better when eating oysters.
6. Seafood tastes better within sight of a large body of water.
7. Eating oysters inland is Risky Business.

I am really missing oysters en famille. Never let it be said that our opinions have been formed without sufficient reference to alternatives. We have dabbled with other sauces – wasabi vinaigrettes, gazpacho dressings, lime and chilli fandanglery and so forth – and found them to be unnecessary fripperies. I myself allow exceptions to Rule #1 when faced with oysters steamed with ginger, shallots, and black vinegar for example, or, in the right company, the chickpea flour tempura numbers at Oh Calcutta; let it be known too that I am no stranger to vodka-oyster shots. We have all eaten smoked oysters on occasion. Nonetheless, these are exceptions and the general principles are adhered to with some rigour. Accordingly, I am a little suspicious of the advice dispensed by a middle aged gentleman from Perth to the effect that if you haven’t eaten an oyster omelette in Bangkok, you haven’t lived.

Anyway, there is, of course, room for differences of opinion in a Menzies-Pike seafood symposium. The generation gap is clearly marked on the question of the mussel, for example. The Elder Statesman is adamant that the humble mussel, bearded, green, black, New Zealand or otherwise, has no place on a civilised table. His granddaughters, most vocally the eldest and youngest, are equally adamant in their respectful disagreement. As the rollmop separates us, wasabi mayonnaise unites us. To seafood extender, we say no in chorus. And then, the baby octopus splits the choir. I have rarely encountered a cooked baby octopus that does not resemble a knot of rubber bands in texture and firmly believe that those responsible for the ubiquity of BBQ baby octopus salad on pub menus should be forced to chew on rubber bands in perpetuity as they contemplate their sins. It stands to reason that if the tentacles of adult octopodes need to be bashed to buggery with a mallet before cooking in order to be tenderised (they do, I promise you), the toughness of the octopodlets must also somehow be sorted out. Some of my closest relatives are not in agreement here.

Hours of pleasant discussion have been dedicated to unravelling the possibilities of cooking beer battered fish en casa. (At this juncture, consensus says no.) Songs have been sung in honour of the sardine, the scallop, of fried whitebait, the pommes frites of the ocean. Can garlic prawns ever be too garlicky? Is there a limit to the number of fresh prawns one can eat in a sitting? Is Doyle’s exceeded by its reputation? Smoked trout or smoked salmon? How raw is your prawn? Is there ever a reason to eat fish fingers? Should anything that once lived in the sea be doused with mornay sauce and cheese and put under the grill? The minutiae of such matters delight us.

The relative merits of crabs and lobsters have been under the microscope recently. Crab meat is alleged to be sweeter and more tender than that of the lobster. My lobster eating experience is reasonably limited and my lobster cooking experience even more so (with some notable exceptions.) Prior to my arrival in Cambodia, however, I was a veritable novice when it came to crab. The not-inconsiderable costs of eating crab and lobster in Sydney aside, the main reason I have, shall we say, avoided crab and lobster, is laziness. All that claw-cracking and shell-manouevring for such a little bit of meat. Who wouldn’t order the scallops? Anyway, lobster, for some reason, retained pride of place in my sea-bug imagination. Lobster tails dressed with lime butter, lobster rolls, bouillabaisse, all of these are good things. I was barely aware of the crab sidling into the limelight. The bright lights of Harry’s Singapore Crab did their bit. The renaissance of the soft-shell crab on Sydney menus helped my infatuation along as did the discovery of pre-picked crabmeat and the ease with which it can be turned into crab-cakes. Nonetheless, when I left Sydney, I was, lamentably, not able to make a sufficiently informed contribution to family discussions of crabs v lobsters. Then I arrived in Kep, the Crab Capital of Crab-Crazy-Cambodia. The question loomed: To Crab or to Lobster?