The Oyster Guide

Drake’s Estero is a shallow blue bowtie nestled into Northern California’s Point Reyes National Seashore. The oyster farm, operated by special arrangement with the National Park Service, was the historic Johnson Oyster Company from 1957 until 2005, when it was bought by the Lunny family of organic beef fame. The Lunnys graze their cattle on the dry, windswept grasslands of Point Reyes; they seem to be treating their oysters with equal care. The oysters, which recently won the national competition for Most Beautiful Pacific, are tender and delicate, quite briny, as you’d expect from an area that sees virtually no rain, and sweet with a touch of bitter herb. They benefit enormously from the backing mountains and the surrounding, 71,000-acre National Seashore, which wall them off from all population sources, orient them toward the empty Pacific, and provide impeccable water quality.