Oyster Cookoff shatters expectations

In only its second year, Apalachicola’s annual Oyster Cookoff Saturday took advantage of sunny skies and huge volunteer participation to blossom into a bustling event.

A sizeable crowd filled the green space, streets and parking lot at Riverfront Park throughout the day. A $2,000 grant from the Tourist Development Council had given the event a boost, as did the smooth coordination of organizers Marisa Getter and Paulette Moss and their large crew of volunteers.

“It’s been awesome,” said Getter, as she gathered up the dozen entries for review by the four-judge panel. “Look at all these people. This is amazing. So far so good, this is awesome.”

Competitors paid $25 for each entry to have their creations judged. This year, Alex Crevar, associate travel editor of Southern Living magazine, and Paul Davis, with the marketing division of the state’s bureau of seafood and aquaculture marketing, joined St. George Island’s Jerry Thompson and Oyster Radio news personality Michael Allen as the judges, from a secured station at the back of the Apalachicola Center for History, Culture and Art.

This year’s entrants included:

• 10-4 (the East Bay Oyster Company) with East Bay Oyster Stew
• Duffie Harrison, with Eastpoint Oyster Surprise
• Caroline and Jeff Ilardi, with Tupelo Oysters
• Christine Smith, with Oyster Imperial
• Joel Norred, with Tasty Marinated Oysters
• Nathan Riley, with Oyster O'Riley
• Brian Walker, with Brunch Oyster
• Cafe Con Leche, with Floridita Oyster Stew
• Eastpoint Volunteer Fire Department, with Rockin' ORC (Oysters Rockefeller)
• Eastpoint Volunteer Fire Department, with Super Toppers
• Owl Café, with Roasted Oyster Muffaletta
• Owl Café, with Southwest Corn and Oyster Chowder

After rating the entries for originality, taste, predominance (how important oysters are to the dish) and presentation, the judges went for the Ilardi’s raw oysters topped with kumquat jelly, kumquat pulp, jalapeno peppers, tupelo honey rice wine vinegar and chopped shallots. This year’s victory was a step up from last year, when Ilardi took second place, with raw oysters topped with cucumber, ginger, shallots and vinegar.

“This year I wanted to try something sweet,” he said. “Now when you make this, you have to experiment, you have to try different balances of the different ingredients. There’s no one way to do it, until you get the right degree of hotness, the right degree of sweetness, saltiness. And you got to keep tasting it until you get it right.”

Ilardi chose rice wine to provide “a little bit of sourness” to counteract the tupelo honey, from Wewahitchka. He found the kumquats in Tamara Suarez’s backyard, the jalapeno peppers from John Inzetta’s backyard, and the oysters from East Hole. The oysters were swerved up on ice in an antique oyster bucket.

Second place went to the Eastpoint Volunteer Fire Department, for their Rockin' ORC (Oysters Rockefeller), a scrumptious blend masterfully put together by Jim Joyner and warmed on an outdoor grill. Third place went to Joel Norred, with Tasty Marinated Oysters, which featured oysters marinated in olive oil and dill spices, served with marinated dill crackers.

After a welcome from Apalachicola Mayor Van Johnson, the day was a busy blend of fun and excitement, as the Apalachicola firefighters served up hot dogs, hamburgers and smoked mullet; and volunteers offered raw, baked, fried and smoked oysters, and oyster stew. Tommy Stevens and Bob Carrino on guitars; followed by The Righteous Kind, a Gainesville rock and R&B band featuring Chuck Martin, Tom Miller, Nick Savage and Larry Thompson; and ending with the Pam Nobles Dancers delighted the afternoon crowd.

Perhaps most pleased by the afternoon’s success was George Watkins, chief of the Apalachicola Volunteer Fire Department, which was the beneficiary of this year’s fundraiser.

“I want to thank everybody that helped and sponsored and volunteered their time and donated and bought stuff from us,” he said. “I want to thank the auxiliary board, they’re the ones who put all this together. Compared to last year, we went though a lot more oysters. We tried smoked mullet and I’d wished we had more. Every year we can improve.”

Watkins said that with the fire station payment covered, most of the new funds will go to make payments on the department’s new truck. “That’s what we really went into debt for,” he said. “That’s my goal, really truly putting it on that truck.”