What
is a Kumamoto? Kumamoto is the name of the large bay on the southern most
Island of Japan, Kyushu. For some reason, a different species developed
there than the most abundant oyster found in Japan, the northern Japanese
oyster, Crassostrea gigas. The Latin name for this unique oyster is Crassostrea
sikamea, now commonly referred to as the Kumamoto Oyster.
How did the Kumamoto become so popular in
the USA? About fifty years ago the oyster growers in Humboldt Bay California
thought they had come up with the solution to the summer oyster problem.
The west coast oyster industry had been importing
oysters from Japan since before World War II and only stopped for the
years during the war. The oysters grown on the West coast from Japanese
seed were used for shucking and found their way on the supermarket shelves
as fresh-shucked oysters in the jar or in cans of oyster chowder. To have
a good quality shucked oyster, it must be firm and fat and not all soft
and mushy as they get during the summer when readying for spawning.
As soon as the big one was dropped, those
oystermen where booking flights over to visit their old oyster buddies
in Japan. The Oyster men in California knew about this beautiful, plump,
sweet oyster located down south in Kumamoto and thought that in the cold
water of Humboldt Bay that those warm water Kumamoto’s would never get
all soft and mushy for spawning. The warm water is what makes the oysters
sexy. Keep them in cold water and they never get in the mood. So they
oyster boys in Humboldt Bay decided to bring over a few million Kumamoto
Seed to see how they would do. For many years after that, the Kumamotos
were cultured in Humboldt Bay and wound up in oyster chowder and on supermarket
selves.
Then the Oystermen got really wise and commissioned
the first successful, commercial oyster hatchery in the USA, Pigeon Point
Shellfish to start raising these Kumamoto seed for them. This way they
wouldn’t have to make those long trips to Japan every year and eat all
that raw fish. Years went by. Then the market for shucked oysters became
more competitive, costs of growing and shucking oysters increased. Those
slow growing, difficult Kumamotos were forgotten
about. Until the early eighties... In 1982 when I was first starting Marinelli
Shellfish, I was looking for new and exciting oysters to sell. Since I
had worked at Pigeon Point for a number of years, I knew all the oyster
farms. I called up my buddies in Humboldt Bay and spoke with the chief
oysterman up there, Twig LaBranche (that’s his real name…). I asked Twig
about all that Kumamoto seed we had been sending him for years. He had
millions of these Kumamotos on his beds and nowhere to sell them. They
had become just too expensive and slow growing for him to do anything
with. Enter the Kumamoto half shell oyster. The initial reaction in San
Francisco where I first marketed the Kumamoto was, “sorry kid, you’ll
never sell them, too small…” Not discouraged I went door to door and bypassed
those stodgy fish wholesalers. When restaurants like Chez Panisse, Fourth
Street Grill and Zuni café started featuring my Kumamotos I knew I had
a hit.
Now oyster farms from California to Washington
are growing the Kumamoto oyster, but the BEST still come from Humboldt
Bay. Twig La Branche has long retired but even more disturbing is that
the Kumamoto oyster is now extinct in Kumamoto Bay. There are no indigenous
Kumamotos left. Pollution has killed them off. The Japanese had too realized
that the Kumamoto was very expensive to grow. The Northern cousin, the
gigas was much easier and profitable and no efforts were made to protect
the Kumamoto species. Now Kumamoto seed is like gold, with oyster farms
up and down the coast fighting over it. The Kumamoto oyster has now become
a rare specimen and a reminder of man’s folly in the oceans.
Bill
Marinelli is known throughout Asia as the “Oyster King”. A Marine biologist
turned fish monger, he has been distributing live shellfish and fresh
fish around the USA and Asia since 1982.
Marinelli Shellfish
2383 S. 200th Street
Seattle, WA 98198
phone: 206-870-0233
fax: 206-870-0238