Les Huîtres de Bélon

Tales of Loaves and Fishes

Every country has its final frontier, its outlying, inaccessible, only semi-legitimate off-spring that never quite gives up its intransigent independence. We might even wonder why a country like France would want a Region like Bretagne (or Brittany, according to the other Brits). The weather can be gloomy, the seas fierce, the food anachronistic, and the people bound tightly to their ancient customs and guttural Gaelic tongue. No question about the beauty of the place, but it's not the gentle beauty of an Italy or the lush paradise of a Brazil.

What Breizh (the local name) does contain in spades is some of the most perfect and abundant oyster beds in the world. The French King Louis XIV discovered this, when he came on conquest to the Bay of Biscay and alit in the village of Riec-sur-Bélon. Other villages and towns might claim the Monarch's oyster-flavored favor—in particular Cancale, Archon, and Morbihan—but the French oyster world adopted the Bélon River for its finest designation.

In a thumbnail, French oysters divide into the native Plates and the Portuguese/Japanese Creuses (imported to help resist the diseases that have periodically ravaged the local beds). Plates measure from a tiny No. 6 all the way up (or actually down) to the much larger 000. Most of the oysters you find in a French restaurant will be No. 3, right in the middle.

Nearly all French oysters are farmed in a two-step process. They start off life in ocean pods, bags, and beds, then, as they mature, are transferred to the Claires—the tidal marshes that line the French coast—where the constant tidal exchange of salt and fresh water over a period of months allows them to gorge themselves on a thick feast of nutrients. The smaller Fines and the fatter Speciales thereby produced receive the suffix, de Claire.

Except on the Bélon River. The beds and farms of this community long ago received the only AOC (Appellation d'origine contrôlée) in the oyster world. For those who know their Champagnes, Bordeaux, Cognacs, and Roqueforts, this means that the Bélon oyster is so unique and special—with a crisp texture and a mildly briny, coppery taste and a tannic accent—that the French government legally protects its name.

When we first met, Glinda was already an oyster fanatic of long standing, whereas Ben couldn't bear the sight, much less the taste and texture, of the mollusk. So it was with an air of supreme sacrifice that Ben put together a Christmas present of trip along the Bretagne coast. Coming out of Saint-Malo, we left behind the highways and hugged the ocean all the way out to the tip of the world at Brest, then executed a left turn south towards Nantes and our true destination, Riec-sur-Bélon.

In a bitterly cold, but clear January, it seemed like all of Bretagne had gone into hibernation. Open hotels and restaurants were few and far. But Bretagne was still France, and anywhere there are French, you will always find an excellent restaurant. So we were wandering around the tiny harbor in Riec, when we heard a commotion of metal buckets from a shuttered maison ostréicole. When we knocked, the owner herself opened the door, clad in rubber apron and gloves.

No, she had no oysters to sell. Did she know where we could find them? Just at the local bistro where the oystermen all took lunch in the off-season.

So we landed a few minutes later in a pretty diner full of tipsy old salts with nothing but time on their hands. Under their approving eye, Glinda slurped down the most memorable 24 oysters of her life. Neither of us can recall what Ben had for lunch—although, the next time we return, he’ll be right in there, slurping away.

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