Coast Chronicles: Oysters, oysters, everywhere! Or not!

If the oyster is your world – or vice versa as as Shakespeare once suggested – then beware. The oyster numbers have dwindled and they are becoming quite expensive.

Whether or not you enjoy devouring this succulent, briny taste of the sea, you should pay attention to its story. The oyster parallels other edibles we humans have practically loved to death.

We have been eating oysters for thousands of years, and for most of that time they were accessible, affordable and necessary protein for our development. Archaeological evidence shows these bivalves were around when dinosaurs roamed.

That said, we humans combined with Mighty Nature have done much to contribute to the oyster’s lack of affordability and availability in the 21st Century. Twentieth Century over-harvesting compounded by man-made pollution are among culprits, as well as several devastating hurricanes that have caused the Mississippi Gulf Coast to build anew.

The optimist in me wants to think we cherish oysters enough to make them thrive again.

As our world population grows we need affordable, sustainable foods – and oysters ARE a highly nutritious, low-calorie superfood. I am in the same survivor mode about crabs and shrimp (after all, I crewed on a shrimp trawler for seven summers in high school and college), but today’s focus is on the oyster.

Maybe we can’t return to 1925 when our Coast processed 44.5 percent of all oysters canned in this country.

We can, however, be better about mitigating polluted waters and stopping man-made freshwater incursions. We can use our scientific knowledge to help recovery after reef-destroying events, such as hurricanes and oil spills.

While walking on the Pass Christian beach several years ago I noticed that the waterline was more ground-up oyster shell than sand, evidence of oyster reef murder not only by Hurricane Katrina and the BP oil spill, but by an unusual number of openings of the Bonnet Carre Spillway.

The spillway was created in the late 1920s to divert over-flowing Mississippi River water into Lake Pontchartrain and our Mississippi Sound to prevent flooding in New Orleans environs.

That unnatural fresh water flush devastates the seafood nurseries that make up our estuaries. It also kills our oyster reefs. Did you know that before the spillway was built, Pass Christian had a working reef that was more than 10 miles wide? And that’s just the Pass.

Our entire coastline was rich with oyster reefs, big and small. In February 1699, Iberville who led the expedition to cement French claims in the New World, made note in his journal of “tracks of turkeys; partridges, which are no bigger than quail; hares like ones in France; some rather good oysters.”

Iberville’s ships were anchored off Ship Island as his men explored the region to locate the mouth of the Mississippi. Long before Iberville’s written mention of oysters, American Indians smoked the oysters for inland trade and ate them fresh themselves. Before the natural beachfront was changed to make way for a seawall and highway, their ancient shell middens abound here.

Later, oysters became a profitable export industry as coastal Mississippi developed into a resort. First they headed to New Orleans diners by steamboat. The advent of the railroad in the 1880s sped up oyster harvesting, with canned oysters and barrels of iced fresh oysters heading out by rail. Seafood factories hummed across the entire Coast.

Picture the giant, tall piles of oyster shells that became the by-product. First the shuckers worked from wharfs, conveniently tossing the shells into the water creating instant landfill. For example, part of the property of the present-day Beau Rivage Casino Resort in Biloxi was created this way.

The shells also became early paving for Coast streets, but that still didn’t solve the problem of what to do with all those shells. Entrepreneurs then went into the crushed oyster shell business, with a common byproduct being grit for chickens. This newspaper in July 1926 reported that in the first six months of the year, 1,184 train car loads of crushed oyster shells were shipped from Biloxi.

Perhaps oysters haven’t been credited enough with the build-up of the Coast population and its diverse culture, beginning in the 1880s with the arrival of Europeans with fishing background. Variously called Austrians, Yugoslavians, Dalmatians, Croatians and Slavonians, they became the backbone of the early seafood industry.

Cajuns from Louisiana and Black Americans joined the seafood workforce, either working boats or in factories sucking oysters, unshelling shrimp or picking crab meat.

So-called Bohemians, immigrants who arrived by train during Baltimore’s off-seasons, also kept factory whistles blowing. The most recent immigrants to keep local seafood alive were the Vietnamese refugees from the 1970s.

Fast-forward to today, a sadly dwindled era for Coast seafood. On the oyster front, a number of federal and state agencies and universities are tackling their decline and, hopefully, revival. Did you know that waters near Deer Island, just a hop from the Biloxi coastline, now lease plots for oyster farming?

Today’s quick stirring of the local oyster history pot is the result of a query from Bob Krebs of Pascagoula. The retired judge called to ask if I am familiar with an oyster stew recipe that does not require milk or cream. Instead it has a clear or light brown broth.

In his retirement years, Bob is suffering from a hankering for his mother’s tasty oyster stew. Most recipes he finds today require milk, so he knows they aren’t what he seeks.

His late mother grew up in landlocked Seminary in Covington County and married into the coastal Krebs family of Jackson County who date to French colonial time. Bob is unsure how his mother came up with her version of the stew.

After talking with his law partner, Eddie Williams, Bob was glad to learn others on the Coast are familiar with an oyster stew that does not use milk. The local French mix – historically Canadian French, French French, Creole French and Cajun French – might have influenced her recipe.

He believes others on the Coast grew up with the no-milk version of oyster stew, and he’s hoping someone will see this and send me a family recipe to pass-along to him. Any takers? Time is running out to make a stew because, as the ole adage says, eat oysters only in R months, or months that have an “r” in the spelling

We have learned that Chef John Folse has a recipe for what he calls “Brown Oyster Stew.” Folse is a popular Louisiana chef known for his radio and TV shows, restaurants and his foodways knowledge. He puts this explanation with his stew recipe:

“The Creoles of New Orleans created a butter and cream-based oyster soup that was so rich it was referred to as oyster stew. The Cajuns, looking to adapt the dish to their bayou style, incorporated the dark brown roux and oyster liquid in place of the butter and cream. Personally, I prefer the bayou version.”

Now, we have an explanation as to why there are two types of oyster stew. Again, any takers on sharing their no-milk family recipe? Oysters may not be as plentiful as they once were, and they are definitely très chers, but a good oyster stew is worth it.

Kat Bergeron, an award-winning veteran reporter and feature writer who specializes in Gulf Coast history and sense of place, is retired from the Sun Herald. She writes this Gulf Coast Chronicles column as a freelance correspondent. Reach her at:

BergeronKat@gmail.com

Or, at Southern Possum Tales, P.O. Box 33, Barboursville, VA 22923

This story was originally published February 27, 2026 at 9:26 AM.