Oysters

Oysters have recently achieved near-meme status as one of several “pick-me” foods alongside the dirty martini, pickles, tinned fish and other briny staples popularized online by Gen Z. These foods are noted for their slightly polarizing air – expressing a preference for them communicates an evolved palate, a niche preference, a willingness to see past an aesthetically questionable facade (the bumpy pickle, the barnacle-encrusted oyster). However, unlike its fellow “pick-me” travelers or its late, meme-ified millennial predecessor, avocado on toast, the oyster itself cannot be readily dismissed as a passing fad.

If I’d known what a whole monkfish looks like, I would never have ordered it. It was only weeks later that I saw a picture of the horrid creature: small, wicked eyes, prehistoric head, skin like rusty medieval armor and a gaping mouth overflowing with jagged teeth. Truly the stuff of nightmares. We’d popped over the border from France into San Sebastián, Spain, for a bite of dinner, selecting a spot a stone’s throw from the Baroque exuberance of Santa Maria del Coro. The daily special was monkfish, and for some reason — perhaps an excess of sun that day — the image that came to mind was, inaccurately, that of the innocent red mullet. The daily special in a fishing town is bound to be fresh, so it seemed fair to give it a try.