From the Season: Ode to Oysters and Caviar

Roy Moes from restaurant De Haven van Zandvoort presents an ode to oysters and caviar. This festive month we are celebrating with 2 luxury products: oysters and caviar.
Caviar

The unfertilized eggs of the sturgeon are what we call caviar. Because sturgeon was threatened with extinction due to overfishing, there has been a ban on wild caviar for about 10 years now, and we only supply farmed caviar. One of the most consumed and farmed types of caviar is Baeri caviar, originating from the Siberian sturgeon (Acipenser Baeri). Baeri caviar consists of beautiful, somewhat smaller eggs with a lightly briny taste featuring hints of almond. Our Baeri caviar comes from House of Caviar, ensuring you receive top-quality caviar.

Oysters Did you know that the Zeeland oyster, or creuse, originally did not come from Zeeland, but was introduced from Japan? The creuse is known for its irregular shape and deep shell and can be thoroughly filled (with liquid). This is in contrast to the Zeeland flat oyster. The French and Irish waters also supply beautiful oysters, each with their own character. The range varies by week; at this moment, for example, we offer Geay, Gillardeau, Baudit, Favier, and Norman oysters from France, and from the Netherlands, creuses from the Eastern Scheldt and the Grevelingenmeer as well as Zeeland flat oysters.

Oysters and Caviar in the Kitchen Purists opt for the raw oyster, at most with a bit of pepper, salt, or lemon juice. Or with red wine vinegar, optionally with a finely diced shallot. An Eastern touch is given with a dressing containing soy sauce, yuzusap, ginger, coriander, and red pepper.

But the oyster can handle much more, such as steaming, barbecuing, frying, deep-frying, and gratinating. A classic is “oysters Rockefeller,” where oysters are sprinkled with a layer of breadcrumbs, parsley, green herbs, and butter, and then gratinated. Gratinating can also be done with Mornay sauce, a béchamel sauce to which Gruyère cheese and egg yolks are added.

And why wouldn’t you combine oyster and caviar? For example, by finely dicing some oyster meat to make tartare, topping it with caviar, and serving it in the shell.

To fully experience the pure briny taste of caviar, it is almost always eaten cold and without too many additions—plain, or as a topping on a warm or cold (fish) dish, or with a classic garnish.

A dish like Pomme Tsarine unites the flavors of potato, sour cream, and caviar. Another classic example is blinis with sour cream and caviar. Roy Moes from restaurant De Haven van Zandvoort makes this classic just a bit more exciting by adding smoked salmon and a poached egg. He shares his recipe with us.

Roy Moes, De Haven van Zandvoort

Since the arrival of chef Roy Moes (51 years old) six years ago, De Haven van Zandvoort has gradually transformed from a beach bar where satay was the hit into a restaurant that is busy year-round and where guests also come to enjoy more luxurious products such as oysters, caviar, and crab. Seafood, along with fine burgers, even appears on a special menu.

Roy Moes: “Oysters and caviar are somewhat decadent products with a luxurious appearance, but they suit our seaside location and our audience. We make the presentation of oysters and caviar something special by lighting up the underside of the plate and by using liquid nitrogen.”

Roy regularly rotates the oysters. Roy: “At the moment, we have French Geay oysters, which are nicely large with almond-like notes. And I enjoy working with Irish oysters, such as the Black Rock. Oysters are a wonderful, primal product; you take them from the sea and can eat them directly without any preparation—that’s simply fantastic! I prefer working with large oysters that have clear, vibrant liquor. Mussels, lobster, king crab, langoustine, salmon—everything from the water we source from Driessen. They deliver the quality I am looking for, and what they supply is always excellent, which you don’t see very often.”

For us, Roy makes two dishes: oysters with an Asian touch and Baeri caviar with blinis.

Oysters with Asian Touch A prawn and an oyster are cooked in almond oil with the oyster liquor, cooked soybeans, lychee, some bean herb, and smoked sea salt, then deglazed with sambai vinegar and yuzusap. This mixture is placed at the bottom of a deep bowl.

A second oyster is patted dry, garnished with edible flowers, sprinkled with a bit of white pepper, and lightly fried in almond oil with a little butter.

Add some wakame into an oyster shell and warm the shell under the salamander or in the oven.

Place the oyster shell on top of the mixture in the deep bowl and insert the fried oyster into it. Pour some cooking juice over it and garnish with a cress, such as borage or shiso purple.

Baeri Caviar, Salmon, Egg, and Blinis

Smoked salmon is marinated in red beet juice for a beautiful red color. Roy Moes presents this dish on a wooden revolving tray with the Baeri caviar on crushed ice in the center, surrounded by a poached egg, the smoked salmon, crème fraîche, and blinis.