Volume 2 Issue 14

November 17 , 2006

Lettitor
By Heather Holbrook

   Consider the oyster. November being one of my favorite R months, it is time to praise the humble oyster. While I like to say I will eat almost anything that comes from the sea, the oyster, raw or roasted, is my favorite. While there are more than 400 species of oysters around the world, I have maybe tasted seven. And the one you and I encounter most is the Eastern Oyster, Crassostrea virginica, and I think they are fabulous.
     Part pearl maker, part vacuum cleaner of the sea, the oyster is at once mythical and common. Native Americans ate them 6,000-8,000 years ago, often smoking them over their campfires. I’ve even read that oysters were used as projectiles by the Huguenots after their ammunition ran out at the siege of La Rochelle in the 16 century. Cassanova reportedly would eat 12 dozen as an appetizer.
     Oysters are not only delicious, but they're also one of the most nutritionally well balanced of foods, containing protein, carbohydrates and lipids. The National Heart and Lung Institute suggest oysters as an ideal food for inclusion in low-cholesterol diets. Oysters are an excellent source of vitamins A, B1(thiamin), B2 (riboflavin), B3 (niacin), C (ascorbic acid) and D (calciferol). Four or five medium size oysters supply the recommended daily allowance of iron, copper, iodine, magnesium, calcium, zinc, manganese and phosphorus. But what I love most about oysters is the social aspect of standing around with friends and neighbors in the cold, waiting for a big batch to be dumped unceremoniously in a steaming heap in front of us. Oh, island life is good.
     I have an oyster roast uniform, don’t you? You don’t? Ah well, then I’ll tell you about mine. Carhartt overalls which hold all my tools: green rubber oyster mitt (ripped and from France), old dish towel, handiwipes, mini bottle of Texas Pete, two oyster knives. No fancy silver monogrammed knife for me; I prefer blue handled plastic from Haddrell’s because I lose them like quarters. And then I choose extremely comfortable shoes and warm socks because if you are serious about consuming your body weight in oysters, you might be standing at the table a while. Long after most of my friends and family have wandered off to do other things, I can be found steadily working the shells open and slurping down the insides, wiping the mud off my knife onto my pant leg. Even down to the lonely cold clusters, there I am. Until the roaster guys come over to my table and drop a whole bucketful in front of me. All mine.
     No chili or hotdogs for me. No crackers; I can eat crackers anytime. Right now I have hundreds of perfect oysters before me on a piece of plywood and I don’t have time for crackers. My goal at each oyster roast I attend is to consume as many lovely bivalves as possible without appearing greedy to the common observer. I strive to look like a casual shucker when in reality, I am in full speed consumption mode, planning my next move while I am chewing one and opening another. If you want conversation, I advise you to go stand near the beer tent: it is one social occasion where I am not much inclined to chat.
      Take your pick of oyster roasts this season. I plan to hit them all. Go to support a cause, go for the fellowship, go to get full. I’ll see you there.

Think ‘gourmet’, everyday
By Heather Holbrook

      Upon entering her storefront in Mount Pleasant, the scent of berry cobbler bubbling in the oven permeates the room. Owner and chef Tricia Hitopoulos deftly cuts succulent chickens in half in their roasting pan and greets her customers by name. Her cuisine is far from the run-of-the-mill, from large casseroles to go, quiches, cold salads and hot dinners reflect Everyday Gourmet’s unique take on everyday foods.
      “My Greek Heritage does play a huge role in my profession,” says Tricia. “I watched my mother prepare some of the best Greek dishes that are still unknown in America . And Greek Easter was always a large celebration for us when I came to Charleston from Columbia every year and watched my grandmother prepare the feast.”
      Everything in Everyday Gourmet is for sale- the food, the wine, bottles of fine Greek olive oil, the art on the walls, the antiques. Two tables stand at the ready for a quick sitdown lunch, but where the action is is the takeout and catering.
      Originally from Columbia, Tricia has a background in marketing and art history and a natural talent for food. Btu it’s more than a passion for good food, “It’s t he spirit of it and that it was made to be eaten as if it were made at home,” she says.
      “Traveling has influenced my cooking and menu choices greatly. Having lived in Belgium for 10 years, the political and cultural capital of the EU (and European melting pot of nationalities), I was exposed to so many cuisines,” she says as she rings up a customer’s pot roast dinner for two.
      Fondly she remembers the Indonesian Rice houses of Holland , Turkish Pizza, Russian Vodka houses, and not to mention some of the best French cuisine in Europe .
      “My chef training started with my working under two of the most renowned chefs in Europe in a 3-Michelin star restaurant (the highest rating in Europe ). Then I lived in Austria for one year where I experienced more Eastern style cuisine and Austrian Wine Houses. Then I attended the French Culinary Institute in NYC and was trained under our well-known chefs in America , Daniel Boulud, Jacques Pepin, Andre Soltner, Julia Child, and finally Francois Payard and Jacques Torres, two of the best chocolatiers in the country. So needless to say, traveling has been an essential ingredient to my education.”
     Today when she vacations, she’s constantly looking for new concepts to try at home. And combined with our Lowcountry cuisine, she says she loves combining a little of every place in my menus and is quick to add, “But only if the flavors make good sense.”
     So it’s a one stop shop, especially this time of year, complete with bottles of wine, take and bake entrees, biscuits and glorious desserts. Comfort food is very important and it brings people to a good, healthy place emotionally, according to Tricia. “Comfort foods are staples and should remain prepared in a home kitchen. But since most of my customers haven't the time to cook, we prepare it my kitchen so that they just have to reheat it home. One of my fantasies is to think that we bring families back together at the dinner table.”
     Certainly there are a few families who do just that as her Everyday Gourmet email list has grown to more than 3500 addresses. Tricia sends out a weekly dinner menu to subscribers. “Yeah,” she laughs, “We started that email menu the first day” she opened her doors back in January 2003.
     The choices seem endless but are not overwhelming. The a la carte menu ranges from cream of tomato and basil soup, stuffed portobello mushroom, pasta casseroles, Greek and Tuscan salads, orzo pasta salad, black bean salad, biscuits, ciabatta bread, cobblers and more. Her different weekly ‘Supper Specials’ menus offer a myriad of dining options from Monday’s Chicken Cordon Blue with Smoked Tomato Cream Sauce over Mashed Potatoes and your choice of a fresh seasonal vegetable to Wednesday’s Pork Tenderloin stuffed with Plum Chutney served over Sweet Mashed Potatoes and your choice of a fresh seasonal vegetable. Both for about $11a plate.
    Everyday Gourmet is located across from the Pig at 1303 Ben Sawyer Boulevard near Sullivan’s TradeABook. Open Monday through Thursday 10am -7pm and Fridays 10am - 6pm. Call 388-2490 or visit www.shopeverydaygourmet.com. To get on her list, email Tricia at hitopoulos@aol.com.

If You’re a Grackle, It’s Good To Be an Old Guy
By Will Post

Noisy and quarrelsome
      In autumn we hear garrulous cackles, rattles and squeaks coming from boat-tailed grackle flocks near our houses. While vocalizing, two or more of the big purple birds face-off and point their bills skyward, raise their hackles, and spread their tails. Although they display only a few inches apart, they seldom touch each other, and very rarely fight, but nevertheless seem to be broadcasting information about their willingness to fight. This behavior is not intended to impress the opposite sex. The females, small chocolate-brown birds about half the size of the males, have already formed their own flocks, and have moved to separate winter quarters. Why, then, do the males expend all this energy displaying?

The old grackle usually wins
      When males gather together, they frequently displace each other from their perches. Certain birds do more displacing than others. It turns out that males are organized as peck-order dominance hierarchies, such as found in chicken flocks.
      With chickens, position in the hierarchy is usually correlated with size, but with grackles, status is related to age. Even the oldest and seemingly most decrepit male is able to maintain a high social position, regardless of how he compares in size to other grackles.
      The same grackles compose the same social groups (“clubs”). The hierarchy seldom changes, regardless of season or locality: the hierarchical system is strongly entrenched in grackle society. Newcomers, males that have hatched the previous summer, join the club each autumn, but always as bottom-grackles. The one who is one up from the bottom is usually one year older, and so on to the top male, usually the oldest. When he dies everyone moves up a notch.
      When juveniles join the flocks, they are subjected to an initiation process that includes being physically attacked by their elders. During this period the juveniles seem to learn their place, and submissively stay at the bottom of the hierarchy. (They also sort things out among themselves). They learn their lessons well, because after initiation, they have to be only rarely reminded (by physical intimidation) of their lowliness. Thus, a state of “social inertia” prevails, because few birds attempted to change rank.

The benefits of high rank
      The question still remains: what are the benefits of high rank? The payoff comes in March when the females arrive on the nesting grounds. They gather on marsh islands and begin building their nests.
      As many as 30 females may nest on one small island. When the females begin building nests, the males move from their wintering grounds and sit in trees around the colony.
      It is during the nest-building period that grackles mate. The top grackle, however, does most of the mating - he is usually the only male that gets close to females. This is when “social inertia” pays off: top grackle doesn’t have to chase other males (they have not forgotten the encounters with their superiors), and can devote all his energies to courting. Meanwhile, the second-ranking male acts as his enforcer, chasing other males that dare to approach females. If the top male leaves the colony to feed, number two has access to females, and numbers three and four act as his enforcers. As to the lowest-ranked males, after several weeks of no female contact, they abandon the colony area, moving to nearby feeding sites.

Can low-ranking males reproduce?
      Observations of marked birds in one South Carolina colony suggested that about 70% of the copulations were accomplished by the top male. But, base on DNA analysis, he fathered only 25% of the nestlings. Another 10% of the nestlings could be assigned to the second- and third-ranking males. This left 65% of the young with fathers who were not club members.
      When they are away from the colonies, females occasionally mate with lower-ranking, probably non-colony males that frequent the feeding areas. Thus, subordinate males are able to add at least a little to the gene pool. In the long run, however, individual colony males father more offspring, especially if they live long enough to ascend high in a hierarchy. When you are young, it may be best to join a group and get in a queue, although you may have to wait nine years to become a top grackle. In the meantime, your contemporaries who lead a solitary life must hang around the feeding areas to meet receptive females. At what point in a grackle’s life is it no longer advantageous to be a loner? At some time, if club males in your age group have better mating success than you, could you join a club and break into line? This is an alternative that you must consider.

Will Post is Curator of birds for CharlestonMuseum. He and his family live on Sullivan’s Island.