EWAN MCASH ON CLYDE RIVER AND THE OYSTER BOYS ARE CHALLENGING TRADITIONANTHONY HUCKSTEP. APRIL 04, 2015 12:00AM

Above: Ewan McAsh “Diners want to taste the characteristics of an oyster.”

Picture: Ray Strang

Source: News Corp Australia

Signature Oysters: Media

here’s something new spawning in our rivers and estuaries. It’s not a toxic

algal bloom, nor some mysterious denizen of the deep. Rather, a new breed of oyster farmer has surfaced to challenge tradition and deliver a super-premium product.

As first light casts a sparkle on the Clyde River on the NSW South Coast, young gun oyster farmer Ewan McAsh takes a few helping hands (aka Woofers) and his dog Nacho out to harvest the day’s catch.

“I’m known as the rock ’n’ roll oyster farmer”, the 34-year-old says with a wry smile. “Some call me anti-traditionalist.”

McAsh is brash, confident and mea-sured. He’s also hell bent on ensuring the longevity of not just his own oys-ter farm — Ewan McAsh Signature Oysters — but that of the industry as a whole.

“For me to grow a good quality oys-ter, I have to do whatever I can to keep that oyster healthy and happy,” he says. And that entails using the latest technology.

Every oyster lover knows the joy of eating a fresh, briny oyster. And when it’s a very good oyster, there’s that extra, ineffable dimension of flavour and texture. That is the experience McAsh is targeting.

Unlike most oyster farmers, the busi-ness is not in McAsh’s blood. He has a degree in marine science and studied fish-farming, but it was his father Kev-in who lured him to the Clyde in 2004. “Dad said, ‘maybe we should get into oyster farming’.”

A week later his father rang him and

Signature Oysters: Media

said: “I found a farm and quit my job.” He’d been working as a public ser-vant for 25 years and neither had run a business — let alone farm oysters.

They took over a traditional stick-and-tray oyster farm in Batemans Bay. Treated sticks catch the oysters, which are then grown in timber trays, also treated with chemicals to stop them rotting. “Over time the chemi-cals leach out,” McAsh says.

He and Kevin researched world’s best practices, travelling to pioneering oyster farms in France, the US, New Zealand, South Australia and Tasma-nia. Then they replaced the treated timber with recycled plastic poles, plastic mesh to catch the oysters and 5-8kg plastic baskets in which to grow single-seed oysters. The prac-tice, McAsh says, is much more sus-tainable than traditional methods. Baskets float on the water’s surface, so the oysters are continually feeding in the top half of the water column but are protected from predators; the basket is flipped to mimic the action of the tide. This means the farmer can span across shallow and deep water to grow the oysters. McAsh also intro-duced a high-speed sorting machine, Shellquip, a new product developed in Tasmania.

Not satisfied with that, in 2010 he opened a little eatery, Ulladulla Oyster Bar (recently sold), to get closer to the end user. By day he was growing oys-ters, by night shucking them for diners.

“I soon realised that what wholesalers were asking for wasn’t actually what the consumer wanted,” he says. “[Din-ers] want to taste the characteristics of an oyster from a certain region — to know it’s a Clyde River Sydney Rock.”

So he set his sights on refining the true characteristics of the oyster and improving product traceability. “Tra-ditionally, you’d grow oysters for three years, put them in a hessian sack, load them on a truck and wait for a cheque. They could be any old oyster for all the consumer knows.”

McAsh began packing his premium oysters in foam boxes lined with hessian (to soak up excess water), labelling them and sending them by freight overnight — from water to plate in 24 hours.

The notion is not new — Gary Rodley (Tathra oysters), Steve Feletti (Moon-light Flats) and a handful of others share similar methods that are chang-ing the way we experience oysters.

There are 20 oyster farmers on the Clyde River, and McAsh is cultivating Sydney Rocks, Pacific and Angasi spe-cies in just 10 of his 20ha.

The river is clean, deep and well-flushed. There isn’t much time for the water to come in, circulate and grow lots of algae and plankton for the oysters to eat. Even McAsh concedes it’s not the most productive river, but says that’s not the point. More im-portant, he believes, is that the natu-ral ecosystem grows unique oysters, culinarily speaking.

McAsh supplies the likes of Rick Stein at Bannister’s at Mollymook on the NSW south coast, Canberra’s Eighty Six, and Mark Best at Sydney’s Marque and Pei Modern in Sydney and Melbourne.

Best is a huge fan of McAsh’s oysters, which he says have “that balance between intense brininess and that real creaminess and meatiness of the oyster itself”.

“His oysters are superb,” he says, “but not only that, he continues to inno-vate, and really, he thinks like an oys-ter. He understands what conditions the oyster requires, not just in the wa-ter, but all the way to our back door.”

According to the latest ABARES Aus-tralian Fisheries Statistics, the entire NSW oyster industry is worth a mod-est $38 million — and the Clyde River accounts for roughly 10 per cent of that. The total value of oyster produc-tion Australia-wide is $97.3 million.

We may think of oysters as luxury food, but for those waist-deep in wa-ter, they’re anything but. Even with the introduction of modern technol-ogy and more sustainable farming methods, McAsh is still limited by the size of his farm and the environmen-tal conditions. And he hates having to say “no” to chefs when demand exceeds supply. “You’re letting them down, but I refuse to give them an in-ferior oyster.”

The predicament got him thinking: when oysters are at their best, the farmer should be able to get a better price and, if there are growers with premium oysters available at differ-ent times, perhaps they could help each other fill gaps in the market.

Now he has teamed up with like-minded oyster farmers to offer a portfolio of premium “Signature Oys-ters” — signatureoysters.com.au — which will launch on April 20.

Those on board alongside Ewan McAsh Signature Oysters include Armstrong Oysters (Camden Haven, NSW), Wilderness Oysters (Wonboyn, NSW), Lease 65 (St Helens, Tasmania), Cloudy Bay Oysters and Blue Moon Oysters (Bruny Island, Tasmania), and West Coast Oysters and Natural Oys-ters (Coffin Bay, South Australia).

Essentially they’re supporting each other and ensuring chefs — and ea-ger diners — aren’t left hanging.

“These are the best oysters we’ve got at a particular time — and for chefs [the result is that] they can cov-er their whole menu with premium oysters from right across Australia,” McAsh says.

There are even plans in the pipeline for an app. “For me it’s not just about growing the oyster,” he says. “I want to ensure that when a couple sits down to have a glass of bubbles and a dozen oysters, it’s the best such ex-perience they could possibly have.”

Meet their molluscsgrew in different shapes, all gnarled around each other, resulting in large hinges that were hard to access. Mod-ern growing methods mean the oys-ters are more uniform, with smaller hinges that make it easier to access. Once you’ve learnt how to open one, you can open a thousand.

1. Wrap a tea towel around the hand that will be holding the oyster, then place the oyster on a bench with the flat side of the shell facing upwards, the hinge closest to you. Insert an oyster knife at the hinge at a 15 degree angle to gain pur-chase between the shells.

2. With moderate pressure, twist the knife (like a motorcycle accelera-tor grip) to break in between the two shells.

Buying. Ever noticed the difference between a tray of pre-shucked oys-ters and those served in a top restau-rant? The latter are better because they are shucked to order. Purchase only unshucked oysters. They’re a live animal and once shucked they quickly deteriorate. Although oys-ters can last some time over ice, they are best eaten within about 20 min-utes of shucking.

Storing. Don’t put unshucked oys-ters in the fridge: it’s too cold for them. They’re happy in 8-9C. Place them in a bowl, cover with a damp cloth and leave on the kitchen bench or in a cool area such as the laundry until ready to consume.

Opening. Shucking oysters is easier than you think. Traditional stick oysters

3. Once the lid has popped, slide the knife along the top of the shell to snip the adductor muscle and re-lease the top shell.

4. Run the knife under the oyster on the bottom shell to snip the bottom adductor muscle and gently roll the oyster over in the shell. Serve.

Hot tip. If the idea of shucking your own oysters with a knife is too daunting, buy them unshucked and put them on the barbecue. The heat will force the shells to pop open, at which point you must take them off the heat straight away. The oyster won’t cook through; rather, the protein sets and remains creamy on the inside. Some chefs believe that warming an oyster through enhances the flavour.