sweet and succulent

Perched atop a large branch at the top my uber sensual food tree iS? Yes, you guessed it -the humble little bilvalve, THE OYSTER. The oyster oozes sensuality, a siren singing from the sea, beckoning us to her. Of course, such sensual beckoning can be sensed from the little critters ONLY in their most pristine state (raw and yes, primal). Once adulterated by a quick roll in the crumbs as a prelude to a boiling lard bath, or Rockefellered and smothered in viscous sauciness, the humble little bivalve's sensuality evaporates as instantly as steam gushing forth from a whistling tea kettle.

Oysters even SOUND sensual...the long ohhhyyy sound, drawn out expectantly on the tongue, almost breathy, igniting the fire before they have been decorously plated before your eyes. Ordering them from a wait person initiates the food foreplay, anticipation building slowly, appetite whetting, palate teasing, inciting hunger for their imminent arrival. Finally, a dozen or half a dozen swim their way over to you, resting gently on a bed of soft, crushed ice, surrounded by dainty lemon slices and petite saucers ladled with the classic oyster bar trifecta: the tart migonette, the biting horseradish, and the blazingly crimson, but otherwise uninspired cocktail sauce.

Glistening in briny liquid pools, nestled in opalescent shells, the oysters scream succulence and like human anatomy, no two oysters look exactly alike...each one unique in size, shape, color, and liquidity. They sit before you, teasing and tauting your senses. You take them in, look them up and down, breathe in their fresh, fragrant scent of the sea. One by one you, you peruse the offerings, your eyes lingering and evaluating each tender morsel; Mana for the Foodie Gods, which one will be first, the chosen one? Is it smaller? Bigger? Juicier? Drier? Plumper? Pinker? Greyer? Thiner? Silkier? than her sisters? So much temptation.

You can hold back no longer, your fingers migrate to the plate, gently, gingerly you grasp the chosen one - -then, a sprinkling of citrus, a dash of the red stuff - the roughness of the shell grazes your lower lip ever so slightly, noticing the rough texture of the shell, in stark contrast to the slipperiness of its jewel. You tip the shell back just a few degrees, sending the sweet pink meat sliding forth from its encasement, landing squarely on your tongue. Your mouth, bathing in briny liquor, the scent of the sea wafting upwards, the texture on your tongue, silky soft, naked, slippery, succulent. A little bite from your teeth releases another squirt of the sea into your mouth, filling it with contrasting tastes and textures (e.g., sweet, salty, smooth, rubbery) as your teeth and tongue tangle with the soft flesh, devouring it, savoring the feel of it all as it glides its way down effortlessly. Repeat (x 5 or 11). By now you have surely enjoyed one or more GastroGasms. I know I have!

The oysters must be fresh (remember to heed the oyster R's in your seafood calendar). As for me, it's January (an R month) and my own memories are fresh and vivid, having been treated to a divine sampling of oysters this weekend, consumed at sunset, with a spicy champagne, overlooking the pacific ocean as waves gently pounded the shore, the golden sun slipping gently into the horizon, a bright pink orchid trail emblazoning the darkening sky. Oysters, teasing the palate, champagne bubbles tickling the tongue in a sensual GastroGasmic dance.

Losing My GastroGasmic Virginity

My nascent awareness that food and sex collide harkens back just a few years - - well, actually more than a few years, when as a 17-year old ingenue, I departed sleepy suburban stomping grounds to begin my maiden voyage - -freshman year at a large, urban university on the eastern seaboard. I was on my way. I had finally arrived! Time for life as an adult at the Big U! Anxious to cut the parental cord and begin cutting my teeth, my freshman year along with requisite freshman 15 was ushered in before my meager belongings had even been carted up to the closet inauspiciously called a ‘dorm room’

“The Towers,” two non-descript, dirt-colored, towering edifices lining a city block on a busy urban thoroughfare would be calling itself home to throngs of eager freshman piling their larder onto hotel style push carts dragged along by weekend warrior dads instead of neatly attired bellcaps in their starched uniforms. Organized chaos ensued as excited newbies and their frenzied parents bravely navigated the choppy waters of college moving day. Emotions ran high, even higher than all the gear stacked on the movable carts. Before long, mascara streaked Moms and sweaty Dads tore themselves away from newly liberated teenaged offspring, climbing back in their station wagons (yes, this was before the days of gas guzzling SUV’s) to make the drive back to suburbia in their new roles as empty nesters.

Before unpacking my steamer trunk and putting away my belongings, i encountered my first collision with the food-sex nexus, lassoing my attention like a skilled wrangler perched atop his muscular mare. At street level, commercial enterprises occupied the space in the freshman dorms, guaranteeing midnight marauding freshman an arsenal of perpetually available munchies to suck down as solace and distraction as they burned the midnight oil, jacked up on impressive amounts of caffeine and sugar. One of the ground floor tenants was a convenience store type place with the usual suspects of uninspired junk food for sale. Nothing wholesome, nothing inventive, and nothing inviting; just a veritable array of generic edibles and potables to satisfy late night cravings. But the other establishment, a gourmet bakeshop catered to a more refined, perhaps more prurient palate, owing to the specialty of the house: CHOCOLATE ORGASMS!!

My innocent 17- year old mind (and body) could barely contain itself, giggling inside and out at the notion of equating a simple chocolate baked morsel with monumental sexual satisfaction, a merger of which I knew much about the former, but almost nothing about the latter. Chocolate Orgasms, intense fudgy little brownie bites that exploded in your mouth, coating it, filling it with waves of ooey, gooey, chocoately goodness. My first GastroGasm, and I had yet to lose my virginity (that took about 3 more months and is a tale for another time, and probably another space).

I lost my Gastrogasmic virginity to a Chocolate Orgasm!! With several extraordinary fudgy bites the genesis of my fascination with food and dining as transcendent, even sexualized bliss was born.