Читать книгу One More Croissant for the Road онлайн

88 страница из 105

Outside, the rain losing heart now, we squelch down to the shoreline to peer at the racks in the distance, where bags of tiny oysters grow into adults, helped by the farmers, who regularly turn and move them to more spacious accommodation to encourage expansion. Once they’re big enough for sale, the oysters are brought up to spend a week or so in an oxygenated, temperature-controlled tank (5–8°C is apparently optimal) to ensure they’re in tip-top health before they’re sorted, with workers weighing each shell in their hands to check they’re heavy, and thus full of water – any suspiciously light ones are discarded as probably dead.

‘In the run-up to Christmas, we employ 69 people here, and they grade 1,800 an hour,’ our guide explains, ‘so they don’t have much time to chat.’ Matt shoots me a meaningful look as the party moves on to the climax of the tour: the dégustation, the oysters already laid out on long tables for our gustatory pleasure. Frankly, I’m relieved to make our excuses and hurry off, though Madame is shocked that we’ll miss the best bit. ‘Ah, les fous Anglais,’ I imagine her muttering as we hastily exit through the gift shop, but I’m content to live up to the national stereotype if it means I don’t have to look another oyster in the frilly gills for a day or so.