What does it take to raise Florida’s best oyster and earn a Michelin Guide recommendation—all while surviving hurricanes, red tide, and TikTok critics? On this episode of The Walk-In Talk Podcast, host Carl Fiadini is joined by Reed Smith, founder of Calusa Oyster Co., and Chef Jon Walker, co-owner of Tides Market in Safety Harbor.
Reed dives deep into the science, sustainability, and politics of oyster farming in the crystal-clear waters of Terra Ceia Aquatic Preserve—sharing how Calusa oysters became a chef favorite and why he’s pushing for statewide change through aquaculture policy reform. Chef Jon brings it all to the plate, discussing seasonal dishes, Gulf seafood pride, and what a Michelin nod means to a small, chef-driven market with big heart.
From sandbar dinners to shark sightings, oyster tumblers to culinary teamwork—this episode is a salty, smart, and soulful celebration of Florida’s food future.
Mentioned in this episode:
Citrus America
Citrus America – Commercial-grade juicing systems built for speed and yield.
Aussie Select - Fully cooked, premium Australian lamb
Fully cooked, premium Australian lamb—ready to serve and packed with clean flavor.
RAK Porcelain USA -Tableware
We use RAK for all in-studio tableware—clean, durable, and designed for chefs.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:32):
You've just stepped inside thewalk and talk, podcast number one
in the nation for food lovers,chefs, and storytellers.
I'm Carl Fiadini, your host,shining a light on the flavor, the
hustle, and the heart of the industry.
We're the official podcast forthe New York, California and Florida
restaurant shows, the PizzaTomorrow Summit, the US Culinary
Open at nafm, and the NorthAmerican media platform for the Burnt
(00:54):
Chef project, recorded at IbisImages Studios, where food photography
comes alive.
And I get that first bite.
Find out moreinfo@thewalkandtalk.com Today's guests
are.
Doing more than just feeding Florida.
They're helping define whatlocal seafood really means.
First, we've got Reed Smith,co owner of Colusa Oyster Company,
whose farm sits in the crystalclear waters off of Terracea Aquatic
(01:17):
Preserve in lower Tampa Bay.
Reed and his team arecultivating oysters with a deep respect
for sustainability, marinehealth, and Florida heritage, navigating
everything from hurricanes toharmful algal blooms to deliver a
clean, consistent product.
Chefs love one of those ChefsJohn Walker, co owner of the Tides
Market in Safey Harbor.
It's a chef driven marketmeats cafe that's become a community
(01:40):
favorite.
John and his wife, Mary Katehave created a space where Florida's
coastal ingredients, likeCalusa oysters shine across a seasonal
rotating menu that.
That just earned a Michelinguide recommendation.
So today we talk tide tables,Red tide raw bars, and what it takes
to build something lasting infood from farm to table.
(02:05):
Chef John, welcome.
Thanks for having me.
Pleasure's mine, man.
First of all, two beautiful dishes.
I wish there were more.
I'm just.
All I'm saying, there were more.
Yeah, I mean, here.
You just have to come to the shop.
No, I mean here.
All right, so you're doingsome really big things up in Safety
harbor, and I got toexperience some of that today.
(02:28):
Freaking amazing.
Can you tell the audienceyou're welcome?
Can you tell the audience what.
What you did?
Absolutely.
So we shucked some beautifulCalusa oysters, and then watermelon
is in season right now.
And I find that the.
The oysters in Tampa Bay arereally salty in a good way, but they
need something to kind of cuta little bit of that salt and add
(02:49):
a little bit of sweetness to it.
So we took watermelon, wepureed some watermelon meat.
We strained it off.
So got kind of got like awatermelon water, and then mix that
with a little champagnevinegar, some shallots, a little
mint, and just spoon that overthe top.
It's kind of A play on mignonettes.
And it was just what it needed.
And then, you know, again,celebrating oysters.
(03:09):
Oysters are probably.
I have a lot of favoritethings, and that's why we open the
Tides, because my wife and Ilove food.
So oysters are one of ourfavorite things.
And so I wanted to do something.
An oyster poway to me is thequintessential sandwich.
Right?
That's.
To me, it's.
It's the best.
But there's more that you cando with oysters.
And so we created a salad.
There's a lot of oyster saladsin and around New Orleans, which
(03:30):
I draw a lot of inspiration from.
And so what I wanted to do wascreate something that was purely
the tides based on friedoysters and a salad.
And so we did that with somehydroponic gem lettuce, some radishes,
tomatoes, a little blue cheeseand some bacon.
And then we made a buttermilk,smoked garlic dressing, dynamite.
(03:50):
It's kind of like ranch oncrack, but it really does the trick
for the salad.
Are you selling that at the market?
We are, we are.
And then the mignonettes, wehave a pretty standard mignonette
that we do with happy hour.
And then our oyster club, weget to play with different mignonettes
and just differentpreparations with oysters.
Gives us a little more freedom.
Are you an oyster house?
(04:12):
100%.
We do a very robust happy hourwith oysters.
It's a Buckishuck.
And then we've just introducedan oyster club which is higher end
oysters from the east and westcoast as well as southern waters.
Kind of very similar to whatReed's doing.
Anything out of the Gulf needsto be exactly the way Reed is raising
his oysters, because that'sthe way to do it then.
(04:33):
Yeah, we are very oysterforward, very local forward.
We're very Florida seafood forward.
How long have you been open?
Three and a half years.
Three and a half years.
But recently, what has it been?
The last year or so you've hadsome major waves, no puns intended.
A lot of action and activityaround your shop.
(04:54):
Yeah, absolutely.
You know, we've.
From day one, we had a prettystrict ethos about where we were
going to source products, howwe were going to source products,
and a standard for quality.
And we've just stayed behindthat and stayed true to ourselves
and just kept our head down.
You know, hard work pays off.
And I think that's why we'vegotten to where we are, is because
(05:16):
we have been unabashed in ourwork ethic.
And we just show up every dayand we try to be consistent in the
product that we put out.
We try to continually have newproducts in the market that will
draw people in.
And then having new productsin the market gives us a whole new
avenue for creativity, becausethen we can showcase those items
(05:37):
in the restaurant.
And so it's very much.
The restaurant supports the market.
The market supports the restaurant.
So it's this symbioticrelationship that we have.
And then you have this, like,nasty TikTok account.
Nasty, right.
Nasty TikTok that's supporting everything.
Absolutely.
TikTok social media.
How important is it in your business?
(06:00):
It's not that it's soimportant to our business.
It's what it's brought to light.
And I think that we've done areally good job of trying to demystify
fish and how to cook it, andthat's really where it all started.
And so we've had a lot ofpeople that have responded that they've
had a newfound confidence totry to cook fish at home, which obviously
(06:21):
we want that to happen.
We are a seafood market firstand foremost, before anything else.
We're a seafood market, andthat's where it all started.
And so if we can get people tofeel more comfortable cooking fish
at home, it's just going to begood for everybody.
I think that there.
There's definitely a bluemovement with farmed and cultivated
seafood, much like what Reedis doing, but across many different
(06:42):
species.
And so we're trying to bringthat to light as well.
And the TikTok has been greatbecause it's.
It's free, right?
I mean, it's free advertising.
You put stuff out there, it'scontent, and people are going to
consume it or they're not.
And that's been pretty widely consumed.
Yeah, you're getting million,million view posts and stuff, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's pretty impressive.
And it's crazy.
We've really upset most of Europe.
(07:06):
A lot of different countriesare not.
Italy's mad at me because Imake risotto the wrong way, and Holland
is mad because we don't domuscles the right way.
I mean, it's just there's allkinds of things that we have put
out there that people haveliked and people have not liked.
We're the.
We're the USA and we do it our way.
That's right.
That's.
Believe it or not, here we come.
This is what it is, you know?
All right, so you and Reed.
(07:28):
You and Reed are our besties.
Right.
And what makes before we bringhim on, why is his oyster so good?
Because he goes to work thesame way every day.
He has a way that he's goingto do things, and he's not going
to take any shortcuts.
He is going to make sure thatit's the best product.
(07:51):
Reid and I, he'll drop offoysters, and we'll talk for an hour
about diploids and triploids.
We'll talk about how thehurricanes have impacted and shaken
the cages, and you can kind ofsee rounded edges.
I mean, the.
The detail that this guy getsinto, you can tell that he loves
everything about it.
And that to me, it's.
It.
It's Reed, it's Theo, it'sEllen up at Little Pond, It's Roland
(08:17):
at LifeArms.
There's a group of people outthere that just have really high
standards for what they aretrying to put out.
And those are the people wewant to support.
Those are the people we getbehind every single time.
Well, Reed seems like a prettycool cat.
Yes.
We're talking like he's notactually a foot and a half away from
us.
He's watching.
He's right here.
Reed.
(08:38):
Yes.
Welcome to the show.
Thank you, my man.
Glad to be here.
Yeah.
We've had a lot ofconversations on the phone.
We have.
Yes.
Long ones.
Long ones, right.
So a conversation with me onthe phone, especially, like, in pregame
hour, two hours, stuff like that.
Sure.
And just for.
That's what it's like to hangout with Reed, though, because he's
that passionate about what he does.
(08:59):
It's what it is.
Yeah.
So we have Reed Senior andReed Junior, but not, like, related,
but just the way, you know, Ijust want to reference that there's
another Reed in the room.
Okay.
And there's actually two johnshere in the room and Chef Carl, where
the hell are you?
I needed here.
You know what I mean?
I needed balance, and you'renot here.
Reid, what makes Terracea the place?
(09:20):
Why.
Why are you growing or raising there?
Best thing we can say aboutit, it is in an aquatic preserve,
so there are no houses.
There is nothing around it tomuddy up, dirty up the waters.
So we're in the shadows of theSkyway bridge, which has tremendous
(09:40):
water flow.
So instead of stuff beingstagnant and, you know, like up in
Hillsborough Bay, which peoplemostly confuse with Tampa Bay, we
are out where we have atremendous water flow, so we get
tons of food.
So our oysters get a lot.
A lot of food to eat asopposed to somewhere that was stagnant,
where they're not getting asmuch food.
So we have crystal clear waterto begin with.
(10:01):
We can see the bottom usuallyabout 10ft deep on most days.
So people have no idea that wehave water in Tampa in the bay that's
that clear.
So it's really clean, reallyclean water and lots of food.
Most people understand thereason why somebody would open a
restaurant.
You know, they can wrap theirbrain around that.
(10:22):
I don't know that the averageperson is going to say, you know,
I'm thinking about, I don'tknow, an oyster farm.
How did you and your wife getinto this business?
Well, we were watchingsomething on TV during COVID and
we saw something on off bottomfarming for oysters.
And we both spent our wholelife in the, in the water.
(10:43):
We've been at the beach,diving, swimming, fishing, sailing,
everything.
So when the thought of havinga business that was, took place in
the water, it was kind of a no brainer.
And we had no walls, nowindows, nothing except for wind,
rain, sun and it's, it'sawesome out there.
(11:03):
Are you still diving now?
Are you still getting in theocean like that?
No, no, I, I'll snorkel.
My wife can dive.
But we have a, we have afriend who is a commercial diver
who has a commercial diving license.
He doesn't do it commerciallybut he does all our dive work for
us.
Reed does have a pretty wickedbackflip off the boat too.
Just for the record.
I am going to have to see thatand oh, there's video.
(11:23):
I'm going to, I'm bringing thecamera crew like we're going to,
we're going to make thishappen in a big way.
Is our only TikTok I think out.
There so well and I think thatreads being a little, I think he's,
he's not really kind ofputting to light how beautiful it
really is out there.
I mean I've been out once at atour of the farm and there's dolphins
and there's fish and there's turtles.
(11:44):
There's so much wildlife.
There's so much just life inthe water.
It's amazing.
What people probably don'tknow is the depth, how deep is, how,
how deep is the bed.
We are on average 8ft.
High tides can get as high as 10.
Low tides can get down to thelowest 6.
But so we are about a hundred,100 yards from us, it's 3ft.
(12:08):
So if the boat goes down wecan, as long as we can swim 100ft
then we can Stand.
So we're not really worriedabout drowning or anything like that,
especially we have guests on board.
But when I'm taller than himtoo, I just stand up.
You stand up.
Stand up.
That's like me.
Yeah.
Well, you can just bounce.
As long as you can bounce ineight feet of water, you can, you
can keep getting there.
So.
All right, 6ft of water, 8ftof water, 10ft of water, that's nothing.
(12:30):
But, you know, I've been.
I started diving when I wasabout 9, 8 or 9 years old with my
father.
And I know that there's,there's all kinds of stuff out there,
sharks and everything.
I mean, what's your experiences?
I mean, a lot of people aregoing to want to know that.
We really haven't seen any onthe farm.
We see everything.
Bait, sheephead, cobia, trout,all kinds of stuff.
(12:52):
But we did a sandbar dinnerabout two weeks ago on the night
of the solstice.
And so we had about 15, 20people out there.
We had set up tables out inthe sandbar.
Another restaurant, they, theydid all the food, all the cooking
and all the rest of that.
And right between the firstand second course.
So some of us were standingoff to the side on the pontoon boat
(13:13):
that brought everybody out there.
And all of a sudden we seesome fins, a pair of fins and then
a trailing fin about 3ftbehind it all in about 2ft of water.
So we made sure nobody lookedover where we were.
So we had sharks.
So the.
Nobody saw it, fortunately,but they were there.
So they are out there.
We see them sometimes going inand out.
(13:34):
Never seen them on the farm,fortunately, but we were concerned
some of those guests mighthave freaked out.
Yeah, it's probably a hammer too.
I bet you there are a lot ofbonnet head sharks out there.
And then either nurse shark,if that's the nerf shark, I don't
think that's really dangerous one.
We've seen some of those likesix footer, seven footers in the
(13:54):
terrace and.
Most of them don't bother you anyway.
But it's still creepy.
It's still a creepy thing.
It's cool to see.
It's still creepy though.
It is.
That's great.
Yeah.
How deep is it in the sandbar?
So I mean, how much of thesandbars underwater?
When we got out there, becausesalsa's been the longest day of the
year, the tides wereabsolutely perfect.
So we got there at about fourand it was just creeping out of the
(14:17):
water and the tides slowlycame in the rest of the night.
So it started where your feetwere in the water and then it got
below your.
Below the knee.
So just mid calf.
So it came in.
It's.
But it's a two tide day, soit's a real long, long incoming.
That sounds pretty cool.
I mean, how many courses?
How many courses?
I wasn't invited.
He wasn't.
Sorry, I can't say.
Same time he was in Ecuador,so he was visiting a Galapagos.
(14:40):
But we did five courses andthen we had an appetizer course.
How often are you doing that?
We did it with the restaurantwe're doing in conjunction with.
We.
That was the first one.
It went off really, really well.
Fortunately.
It could have been an epicdisaster, an epic success.
And epic success was what we got.
Perfect sunset.
I mean, it was.
It was framed.
The skyway in the background.
(15:01):
It couldn't.
It's exactly like.
We drew it up like we hoped.
We hoped, we expected it would be.
So I don't know if they'veannounced it publicly, but I'll write
them out now.
It's.
We plan another one forSeptember 5th.
So it'll be announced on our.
Is that our formal invitation?
Is that what we're hearing?
Yeah, Yep, exactly.
He was looking at me in the eye.
(15:22):
He made eye contact.
I saw it, you know, September 5th.
So they haven't.
I don't think it's been publicyet, but I'll go and say.
Because we booked it.
So I think you got four trickat Solar.
I think here we're in.
No guarantee on the sharks, though.
That could be dolphins.
Real quick side story, I wasdiving from about 8 to about 18.
(15:44):
And the last time I wasfishing, we were on my dad's boat
and we were way out, way out.
We were trolling and it washot as.
Just hot, just super hot.
Hot as what?
Hot as hell.
And so, you know, he powersdown and.
And we jump in the water.
We're just hanging out, youknow, I'm hanging on the.
On the back of the boat andjust dangling there, you know, and
(16:05):
the lines start to.
To fall or whatever.
And I don't know, 15 minutesin the line hit like.
And it just went.
I was.
We jump in the boat and I'mmaybe £160, something like that.
And I'm like, pop, this is.
You know, it's as it'sgetting, you know, it's getting out
(16:28):
there.
I give it to pull to my fatherand he gives me the gaff and I'm
looking over the side and,and, and it Was about eight feet.
This, it was a mako and, andit just.
No thanks.
Yeah, well, so it got, luckilyit, it broke the line, right, because
it got up to the side of theboat and I'm with the gaff and I'm
just looking at this thinglike it's way bigger than me.
(16:49):
I'm like, holy crap.
And as I was getting thecajones to, you know, it broke off
thankfully.
But after then I thought tomyself, first of all, never getting
into blue water ever again.
Like never again is that happening.
And then I.
No, no, no.
I just, I lost my, my spiritfor it.
Well, we were that we werefishing on the Boca grand when we
(17:12):
were in high school.
We in a 17 foot Mako and we'reon this sunken shrimp boat and a
hammerhead that was, and I'mnot an exaggerator, it was as long
as the boat.
The dorsal fin was so tallthat it, that it bent over.
It couldn't support the weightof its own self.
And we looked at my friend andI looked at each other and said to
Wilson, I was like, holy crap,we might be in trouble here.
(17:35):
Fortunately, this guy who, whofishes for sharks came out, hooked
him right away.
We, we pulled the anchor like,see you.
Good luck, Armando.
Have fun with that.
We got out of there.
But when this fin went by andit was way by the side of the boat
and it was, was bent over thetop because it couldn't support its
weight, that was.
Made you think twice aboutbeing out there.
I don't care what anybodysays, that's intimidating.
(17:58):
And you know what the fact is,is yeah, you know, pet its head and
push it over and tickle its belly.
Nah, forget about it.
What are we talking about here?
Get me out.
Get me out.
I mean the hammerhead is just,the look of that is just even more
menacing.
Truth be told.
True.
I will say, like it's reallynot an aggressive.
Like they don't typically,you're not going to get attacked
by a hammerhead or a school of them.
(18:20):
You know, that's not the one typically.
But when you see them and likeeven if I saw a little five foot
nurse shark or something likethat, I'm gonna still be a little
like, I don't care.
I'm not afraid to say it.
I'm man enough to say it.
So I grew up on the east coastand we used to catch spinner sharks
and you would hook them likeright in the surf.
You'd be in a boat and fishingthe, the beach.
(18:41):
Right.
And so you catch these spinnersharks, and they would run towards
the beach and they would jumpout of the water and they would spin
or do like a little verticalrotate or whatever.
And so I remember hooking intoone of them and, like, he was running
towards the beach, and therewas like this little family of four
swimming right in the breakwater.
And his shark was likebreaking water.
(19:02):
And these four people, I swearthey got on top of the water and
ran out.
So it doesn't have to be bluewater either.
I know I'm.
I'm much braver in the shallows.
No, even I know.
I get it.
I understand.
But it's different.
It's still different.
It's the shark's house.
It's the shark house.
Yeah, it is.
You know, we gotta live somewhere.
(19:23):
But, yeah, you're right.
You know, that's where they live.
Chef, you're from Miami, andyou somehow made your way to New
Orleans.
What was that experience like?
And the reason I'm asking isone of our brethren, our walk and
talk brethren, is Put Rivera,which I know, I told him about this,
and he wanted to be here today.
He's in New Orleans.
He was going to come out.
The schedule wasn't.
(19:43):
Wasn't right.
But what.
How was your experience thereand what made you leave?
So I was 18 when I moved toNew Orleans and was ill prepared
to live on my own as an adult,going to college for the first time.
And so I went to Loyola in NewOrleans for two years, and they politely
asked me to reevaluate mypriorities and maybe come back in
(20:03):
a semester.
So I was out of school and Istarted cooking.
And it was amazing.
I mean, what a great place togo and learn a craft.
Not to mention that I wouldwork from 2 in the afternoon until
midnight and then drink dollarbeers and listen to just incredible
music until dawn every day.
So it was an incredible experience.
(20:24):
You know, I did a lot of things.
You know, I worked for free.
There were events and thingswhere, you know, I wanted to learn
how to do something that Chefwas doing at whatever restaurant
I was working at.
And so it was a reallyincredible experience where I got
to do a lot of things that I'dnever done before, seen a lot of
things that I'd never seen before.
I started in restaurants whenI was like, 14.
I had to get a work permitfrom the school I was going to and
(20:46):
bus and tables and that kindof thing.
So to be in a differentposition where I was actually getting
to create things was.
It really sparked something inme, you know, I think it's, I've
still got that spark.
So it's really been a lastingexperience that I draw on to this
day.
Reid, take us through atypical day on the water.
(21:07):
Well, it starts early so weusually get up 4:45 5:00am we drive
about an hour to get to wherewe keep the boat stored.
So since we're in this aquaticpreserve, there's no commerce, there's
no working waterfront.
So everything we have to traileverything in, trailer everything
out.
We don't have a dock we canpull up to unfortunately.
So we get there, load the boatup, drive it, put it in the water.
(21:31):
That's usually about, about6:30 in the morning when we're getting,
or 6:30 to 7 we're getting inthe water.
We take a slow ride throughNoeg zone through just a beautiful,
beautiful mangrove protected bay.
We have in the wintertime wehave some awesome white pelicans.
When they come down, they'reall over.
It's really cool to see them.
We see all kind.
We see dolphins feeding so inthe spring they're teaching their
(21:54):
little pups how to eat.
So sometimes we'll see themknock fish out of the, out of the
air, in the air and you know,to stun them and then little ones
eat.
So we just, so we go throughjust beautiful country, getting out
there, slow wake.
And then once we break themangroves up there, then it's about
a short five minute ride tothe farm.
So when we get, once we get tothe farm we kind of on the way out,
(22:14):
Reid and I figure out kind ofwhat we're going to do for the day,
reassess if something'schanged, if we have a speeded up
harvest or something extra weneed to do.
And we kind of talked aboutwhat we're going to do.
So we get out there and wehook up the boat to one of the lines
and then get to work.
So we, we have cages that, soour cages, they have our bags where
all the oysters are, theyfloating the surface.
(22:34):
So what we'll do is we'll pullthose up and then depending on what
time of day and what time ofyear and what we've done the last
couple weeks, we'll pull eachof those bags out and sometimes we'll
put them through a tumblerwhich is a big machine, it has a
long tube which is a wholebunch of whole perforations in it.
And what they do is we'll,we'll dump them through that well,
the, the tumbler will Tumble.
It will help break the edge ofthe shells, because end of an oyster
(22:57):
shell is like a finger.
So they'll break off.
And when they, when that stuffbreaks off, it kind of induces the
oysters to kind of grow more deep.
So they put their effort intogrowing where they can grow that
shell.
And so you keep.
The edges keep getting knockedoff, then they can grow deeper, and
that gives that deeper cupthat everyone likes, because then
you have.
When you have great water,there's more water in that rather
than a flat oyster.
(23:18):
So then it gets a lot more flavor.
So it grows in there.
So we're running through that tumbler.
So the big ones will get tothe end, the small ones will drop
through the holes and they'llend up in a tub.
So that's how we separate them.
So we'll store them by size,and then the.
And then that they'll kind ofhelp them form and shape and get
to the end.
And then we'll separate themout and put them back in the bags.
And then we put them.
Then we'll put those.
(23:38):
Those bags back in the cageand put them down and move to the
next one, separate and sort them.
Would that be considered your.
Your quality control?
Is that.
How is.
Is that like the genesis ofwhat makes a great oyster?
It's consistent.
Yeah.
So when we get out there, theother thing people don't realize
is think they see an oysterout of water, think that's like the
kiss of death when it actually isn't.
(23:59):
What it does is it helps ouroysters out of the water.
It helps kill any kind ofparasites, anything, barnacles, anything
that's growing on them that'sgoing to make the shell not as pretty
or just cause an issue.
Like there's some things thatcan drill into the shell.
So when they're out of waterfor a period of time, no more than
24 hours, and that helps kill things.
So that's kind of qualitycontrol there.
We put them in the tumbler.
(24:20):
So what that does is, youknow, all oyster farms, most all
oyster farms will use a tumbler.
And what that does, it helpsnot only sort, but helps work on
that shell, creating thatshell that all the restaurants and
a lot of people like.
So those are the kind of thetwo big quality control.
But the other thing is justgetting out there and doing it every,
every day.
So we're out there and wetouch our oysters.
We'll probably touch themtwice a month.
(24:41):
So on average, 24.
20 to 24 times before they're harvested.
So it's.
There's a lot of.
There's a.
There's a lot of touching, alot of feeling, a lot of, you know,
massaging kind of what's.
Where they are, what they're in.
And so the big thing for us,we found is when we do that sorting,
it's really important becausewe need to keep the density in the
bags low, and that's where wetry and keep it about 150.
(25:02):
That way they get plenty of water.
They're not fighting for food.
(25:37):
So when you see one of thoselong, skinny oysters, that's meaning
they were clumped up with abunch of other ones.
Whether it's a wild oyster orsomething else, that means somebody
had their bags were too.
There were two dents or toomany in there, because those oysters
are searching for food.
So they're trying to findwhere they can get fresh water.
It's kind of like grass.
You know, grass towards the sun.
Moisture will grow towardswherever that water flows for them
to get oyster.
So we try and make sure we'reout there.
(25:59):
We can try and tumble them,try and work them as.
As much as possible, as muchas Mother Nature and Poseidon will
let us get out there and do it.
Chef John, what doesconsistency in oysters mean from
a chef's perspective?
I mean, we want.
It's tough, too, with the wild product.
It's a. I mean, I say wild,but it's.
Obviously, you're farmingthem, Reed, but it.
It's still a wild product atthe end of.
(26:21):
And so consistency for me isprobably going to be a little bit
different for.
Than other chefs.
What I'm looking for is theright size, the right meat to shell
ratio.
Those edges that Reed keepstalking about, it's.
That's hugely important.
If I get a bag of oystersthat's got really sharp edges on
it, I know that there hasn'tbeen a lot of care taking in them.
(26:44):
And so that's what we'relooking for.
We're looking at the same waywhen we check in fish.
You know, you're looking forclear eyes, red gills for meat, that
kind of thing.
With oysters, I'm lookingreally a really tight seal between
the shells.
I'm looking to make sure thatthe edges aren't too sharp.
I'm looking to see if there'sa good.
What did you call it?
A elbow.
(27:04):
That.
That joint right there.
I want to make sure that I canget a knife in there.
There's a hinge.
The hinge?
Yeah.
Thank you.
You know that those are what,those are the things that I'm looking
for in a consistent oyster.
You know, the other thing thatI'll say is, is that I have an outlet
for, for those oysters thatReed has with the barnacles and things
like that.
We do a dollar oyster at theshop and, you know, that's where
(27:26):
those oysters are key.
There really isn't anythingthat Reed could bring me that I wouldn't
be happy with.
We call those hurricaneoysters because there were lots of
times in weeks where weweren't able to get out and work
them as much as possible.
So things grew on them.
You can, you know, it'sreally, really hard to stay ahead
of them.
So the hurricanes prevented uswhere there were a couple weeks at
a time when we couldn't go outand do it.
(27:47):
So when those things are onthere, it's a lot of work to get
them clean.
Because when we deliver anoyster, I don't think if we're getting
a luxury product, a high endproduct, I don't think you should
have to do much work to it.
You shouldn't have to cleanit, you shouldn't have to do a lot
of work.
It should be pretty much pullout of the bag and serve.
So we spend a lot of timetrying cleaning and stuff when there
are things that do grow on it.
So for like, for John'sactually, if there's some.
(28:08):
He's like, you know, we needsome happier oysters.
If we have that, then we know,hey, that's great.
We can get him more withouthaving to do a lot of work to it.
So.
Well, and I'm.
One of my favorite movies isWhite Men Can't Jump.
And there's a line in thatmovie that says that I would rather
win first and look good second.
And to me, that's what it'sabout with oysters, right?
It's that meat to shell ratio helpful.
(28:29):
Is that oyster, when you openit, is it spawned out?
Is it real loose and liquidyor is it firm and full of meat?
You know, that's, that's whatI'm talking.
You win first with the meatand then there's the look.
So are you able to eyeball aCalusa oyster?
Yep.
You can tell which.
You can tell that's.
Yeah, that's a colossus.
(28:50):
That's reeds.
We have four to six, sevenoysters on hand at any one time.
We're probably going throughfive or six thousand oysters a week.
So, yeah, I can by Sight I cantell you the oysters that we use
a lot of like reeds.
I can pick those out of a.
Crab, no problem, especiallyhis reed rent hide and hurricanes.
(29:11):
It was a tough season last year.
Talk about it.
Well, we've kind of beenknown, I'm kind of known some places
now as Mr. Red Tide because wewere, we were shut down for seven
months to harvesting.
So what that says is the statedoes a very, very good job of monitoring
the water.
(29:31):
And if the red tide level isjust above, kind of not there at
all, then they shut us downfor harvest.
And in some ways that sucks.
We always say we have anotherterm red tide sucks.
But what it does, it makes it,it protects the consumer on, on the
tail end.
So oysters are the most highlyregulated protein in the country.
(29:54):
So our oysters are temped fromwhen they, when they come on the
boat till they go in a cooler,till they leave the cooler, till
they get to a restaurant.
So when the red tide, when thered tide happens, you know, the state
is checking every single week.
So it's unfortunate when thatstuff happens.
We have to close.
But it's from a protection standpoint.
So, you know, if you'relooking at business, you think, how
(30:14):
can I go seven months?
Or how to, you know, why wouldyou want to visit, go seven months
without, without any sales?
Well, it sucks there as well.
But what it's done is itcaused us to look at other options
in order to mitigate, to addresiliency to what we're doing.
So there's a thing, wetstorage, that most people are familiar
with and don't realize it.
But the old days, if you'reold enough, you've seen lobsters
(30:37):
and tanks, and they will.
Grocery stores, that's a wetstorage facility.
On a small scale, what thatdoes is it preserves that living
animal in time before it'sharvested, meaning you take it home
and cook it.
So what we're looking at is.
And they do it in the westcoast and some.
A couple places in Canada.
So it's nothing new.
It's just.
It hasn't been approved.
No one's been approved for itin Florida.
(30:58):
So they're larger, large,large tanks with filtered water.
It continues to run through it.
So what we'll be able to do iswhen we get that facility up and
running, we'll be able to putthose oysters in that, in that tank.
And so that filtered waterwill help purge any red tide, any
toxins, anything that's in thewater that's undesirable that would
make it unsafe in the state'seyes to take to market.
(31:20):
So we'll put it in there.
It'll be in there for three orfour days, generally.
That's kind of the regulationsright now.
And then eventually afterabout a week, we'll probably do it
a little longer than the statewill come in and test that meat from
it.
And then if they say that'sgood, then we can harvest.
So instead of being able to beclosed for seven months, we won't.
We wouldn't have a closure at all.
We just harvest, put in thetanks, let it clean, and then.
(31:40):
And harvest it.
So that's a big thing we'relooking into.
And we're planning on workingon Moat Marine down in Sarasota.
They have built a facility andthey worked on some of the regulations,
getting them approved for the state.
So we were.
We'll work with them, too, onthe tank, build out and all the rest
of that.
And they may be able to helpout with some manpower to help monitor
and do some of the things thatwe need to do for that.
(32:01):
So that's a big thing.
So that would mitigate allthose issues, and we'd be.
We'd be able to work inharvest year round.
I think he's being a littlemodest, though, because the program
that he just laid out is notjust for him, though.
I mean, he's working on it forlike a.
Like a working waterfront sothat it can be something that helps
everybody in Florida.
And that's one of the thingsabout Reid, too, is that this isn't
(32:21):
a selfish.
A selfish endeavor for him.
It's not just about sellingoysters and making money.
I mean, he has to do that.
But there's also a greatergood that he's working on for all
of the shellfish farmers inthe state.
So he.
He kind of needs a round ofapplause for that, too.
Oh, yeah.
Right on, Chef.
What you're saying, I mean,part of the conversation, one of
(32:42):
our conversations that we had.
Reed, you're going to explainit better than I can, but ultimately
you're going to get politicalwith this.
How so?
The, like, anything, once youget into something, you realize there's
a whole lot more to it.
So if you, like six monthsago, you had asked me, hey, are you
going to be involved inpolitics, anything, lobbying, anything
on those levels, I would havesaid, heck, no.
All I just want to do is Ijust want to farm and, you know,
(33:05):
grow oysters for people andsell them.
But as we've gotten involvedin this.
We found that in order to getworking on this wet, wet storage
facility, we're going to needcounty approval, a bunch of them,
state approval.
We're going to need supportfrom fwc, the FDACS people, a whole
lot of people around the statein order to come together to help
that.
And a lot of that that comeswith it, as well as research and
(33:26):
other things.
And then so that researchthing gets into national stuff.
So the usda, they have adivision that of aquaculture, of
support and research hasdevoted a little bit of.
A little bit of support andfunding to.
But there's not an office ofaquaculture at the usda.
And when the storms comethrough, we found that there was
no insurance for us.
(33:47):
There's no insurance or ourequipment or anything else really.
So there is sometimes.
Sometimes there's governmentsupport for.
In a disaster effort.
But aquaculture is notconsidered agriculture in the way
that, you know that astrawberry farm would be or a blueberry
farm or something like that.
So what we're.
One thing we're working on,and we were lobbying DC with, is
(34:07):
to create an office ofaquaculture at the USDA.
Be about 14 people.
But what that does is it wouldconsolidate three or four different
places that you have to go tofor either support or aid or research
and all the rest of the stuffand put it all in one spot.
Aquaculture is kind of theredheaded stepchild.
It's getting bigger.
So it's more and more important.
(34:28):
I think everybody we talk toin D.C. from our senators from Florida
up there, they understand thenature of the blue food economy and
how it can.
How it really needs to growand needs support in that case.
So they are really behind that.
So we've started to deal with that.
And then there's another thingI never thought I'd know and never
(34:48):
thought I'd need to know, butthere is hazardous.
There are hazardous importsthat come in from shellfish from
all over the world.
And you can imagine where mostof them probably come from.
There are contaminants in there.
There are harmful algal blooms.
There's PFAs.
There's a whole bunch of otherstuff that comes in and they look
at it as, oh, well, it can becooked out.
Well, most of that stuff can'tbe cooked out.
So right now that there isnobody at the FDA that is allowed
(35:11):
to destroy harmful imports.
So if those things come in,basically what they do is turn around,
send them back.
They don't have the power todestroy them, so they go back to
the country of origin.
And they'll either relabelthem as like office parts or something
like that, or machineequipment, or send them to another
country and send them in,because then only 2% of the containers
that come and get checked.
So that's another thing westarted working on is like realize
(35:34):
like, hey, you can't cook thisstuff out.
So if something's comingintended to be cooked, they don't
check it because they think isit's, oh, it's going to be cooked
out.
Well, it's not, and it's goingto be bad.
So that's getting helping FDAhave that approval and that ability
to destroy it right theninstead of shipping it back.
And then God knows what theydo to it when it comes back.
So those are some of thethings we've gotten had to get involved
(35:55):
with.
Chef, do you prefer oystersfrom the Gulf of America or elsewhere?
Well, the interesting thing isthat in the Gulf, it's the same species
of oyster from Canada all theway down the east coast, around Florida
(36:17):
and through the Gulf ofAmerica and down around into Texas.
It's all the same species.
It's the body of water thatit's pulled from that makes a difference.
It's the salinity, it's theminerality, it's the maroir, if you
will, of that oyster, whichgives it its flavor.
(36:38):
So I have some favorites in Canada.
I have some favorites on theWest Coast.
I have some favorites inFlorida and along the Gulf Coast.
So they're all different.
So which one is better, Gulfof America or Gulf of Mexico?
I'm going to have to go withthe Gulf of Mexico on that one.
Just saying.
TikTok, you know where he resides?
(36:59):
That's right at the Tides Market.
Come get me.
How did you two connect?
So, look, we're digging deepinto a lot of interesting angles
of, you know, aquaculture and oysters.
But at the end of the day,we've had some colorful, fun jokes
(37:20):
and conversation here todayduring production.
How did you guys meet?
You guys are made for eachother, by the way.
Yeah, I.
We were kind of talking aboutthat earlier.
We don't exactly know how we met.
It just sort of happened one day.
Yeah, I think we concocted ouridea about the same time that they
concocted their tides idea.
So we had to get a lot ofregulatory stuff and get a final
(37:44):
lease and find the space inthe water.
So we weren't officially inbusiness at that point.
We were planning and gettingready for it.
And I think I was.
I was.
I don't know how I came acrossit, but I saw it and either John
may have sent something to usbecause I didn't do TikTok, I didn't
do any social media of anysort until we did had to do this
and obviously it's very important.
(38:04):
So he's right now either I sawhim and I was like, oh, I'm go by.
I think I probably saw theirTikTok or their Instagram account.
I was like, I'm going to go bythere and just cold called and walked
in there.
Yeah.
And I think I may have reachedout to you on Instagram at some point
too.
Yeah.
But one day it was just I wasat the seafood counter and he was
on the other side and we juststarted talking and the next thing
(38:27):
I know he, he said dumb thenoiser farmer.
And I was like, well, allright then let's, yeah, come over
here, let's talk a littlewhile longer.
And I think they, and when wefirst went in there, high quality
stuff is very important to me.
I really appreciate so allthe, everything they carried at the
time, they had pots and pansand a whole bunch of other stuff
was really, really high end.
It was all really good quality.
(38:47):
And so, and my wife knows likeif we're going to be associated or
sell a place, we want to be apartner who, we want to be in business
with them.
And so I think we startedtalking and just about our process
and how if it's not ready,it's not ready.
If it's not right, it's not right.
We don't want to do it if itfirst year, they don't come out looking
great and all these sorts of things.
So I think we are talkingabout our plan for equality and making
(39:11):
sure that it's right and it'sgood and high end because it's just,
you know, I don't want to beassociated with something that's
really kind of low in.
And you know, at that pointwe're going to put all the work into
it.
So then you could tell by thequality products they had in there
from the meat and the case andeverything else that this was, they
were serious about it anddoing it at a high end.
So chef, how do you build aseasonal dish around an oyster?
(39:35):
If I'm being honest with mywife's permission, Reed, you know
my wife.
I've heard that.
No, I mean it's, it's, it'slike anything else.
I mean an oyster to me is,it's, there's There's a lot that
you can do with it.
And I think that that's thething that people.
(39:55):
That people always kind of goback to the dozen raw, you know,
but there's so much more to anoyster, and there's so many different.
Again, it's the maroir.
So it's.
Every oyster is a little bit different.
Every oyster's got a story.
So in and of itself, anoyster's pretty inspirational.
And so it doesn't matter ifyou're shucking a calusa, a beausoleil,
a kumamoto, a blonde.
(40:16):
They all have their own characteristics.
They all have their own way.
And so for me, it's just amatter of finding things that are
in season that I think mighttaste good with them.
It's really not hard.
And my wife really is the boss.
Just getting that didn't.
Eric, what does it mean tohave earned a Michelin recommendation?
(40:38):
Oh, my gosh.
That I am still blown away tobe in the company of those other
chefs and restaurateurs.
I am completely humbled.
I am.
It's just surreal.
It's been tremendous for the business.
It's been so validating forthe work that we put into it, that.
(41:02):
Yeah, it's tough to put thatone into words.
And being at that event whereit was all announced and the red
carpet and the.
You know, it was just.
It was mind blowing.
Being in the room with thesepeople that I looked up to for so
long and been to theserestaurants and so admired their
cuisine, and I'm in the sameroom with these guys and gals.
(41:24):
It was truly something otherworldly.
You know, a lot of chefs havedifferent opinions on.
On Michelin in general.
Since you got therecommendation, has your opinion
changed of Michelin from before?
Is it the same?
Do you.
You know, is it deeper?
I wanted Michelin to come toPinellas county, where we are.
(41:45):
They've been in Tampa for alittle while.
And so Mary Kate and I had hadthe conversation like, we need to
do something with.
Visit St. Pete, Clearwater, orwith a tourism board.
We need to figure out how toget Michelin to Pinellas County.
Not for us.
That was never the goal.
But the goal was, was to bringto light these people that are doing
a great job.
(42:05):
We weren't chasing Michelin.
We weren't.
You know, I applied for aJames Beard award, you.
You know, fill out anapplication and that kind of thing.
And I did that last year, youknow, more of just to kind of test
the waters.
But my opinion has not changedon Michelin you know, there are anonymous
inspectors that go into theseplaces, right.
Like it's, it's the real deal.
(42:26):
Like they don't mess aroundand they find people that are doing
the right things because it'sthe right thing to do and consistently
executing those visions.
And so, yeah, it's, it hasn'tchanged the way that I've looked
at anything.
It's validated the hard workthat we put in and makes us want
to work that much harder.
We've got a recommendationthis year and so.
(42:48):
Well, we weren't chasing Michelin.
I mean, I'm definitely pushingthe envelope now and trying to, to
do more and create more valuefor our guests and just continue
to try to push the envelopeand move us forward.
Do you have the staff to do that?
Yeah, that's the, I meanthat's really.
(43:10):
The, that's the biggest thingis the, it's all the ancillary players
right in the, in therestaurant, the whole restaurant.
And they can't be there opento close every day, nor do I want
to be.
I've got three kids I want toraise and I'm going to spend time
with my wife and do other things.
But yeah, we've got somereally great people.
One of the best things we didthis year was hire a general manager
and she has come in andabsolutely maintained our standards
(43:32):
and elevated our service.
You know, it is everything.
It is how clean the bathroomis and deserve trash on the floor
and can you see, you know,messy service stations and things
like that.
So, yeah, I think on the frontof the house side we've definitely
elevated things in the back ofthe house we've got a couple of animals
back there that have embracedour standards and pushed us even
(43:56):
further from an hourly position.
So, yeah, long answer is,yeah, our staff is there, they're
bought in.
When we got therecommendation, we had cookies made
with the Michelin emblem onthem and we, Mary Kate wrote a note
to every single person on thestaff and said, thank you so much
for your hard work.
(44:16):
We wouldn't be here without you.
And I think that's really.
It's that culture that we're,we're building and developing that
is going to help us maintainand get us to the next level.
We'll never be a star kind of place.
We just want to stay on theguide and we want to stay true to
who we are and that helps.
Them attract talent and retaintalent in a situation like that.
(44:37):
So they're known, appreciated.
There are people who've beenthere since Day one that the first
time I walked in there thatare still there, you know, and restaurants.
That's Robert can't go anywhere.
He's my brother in law.
Yeah.
And Miranda, I think Miranda'sstill out.
Right.
So Miranda was there for helping.
So it's a place where peoplelike and want to be there.
And if you're there to cook inthe kitchen, you're like, hey, this
is a place that I want to be.
(44:58):
I'm going to get recognized orwhat I'm doing here is going to matter
to people so well.
And the cooks get to usereally great ingredients.
You know, it's domesticgrouper and snapper.
It's high end sushi, tuna and salmon.
I mean, they enjoy working.
I've had a couple cooks thathave left other places because they
weren't proud of the productthey were serving.
(45:19):
Part of what attracts me tobeards or Michelin establishments,
it's the workflow, it's thecleanliness, and it's the cleanliness
during the work and howeverybody has to be on board with
that.
Because now you're talkingabout, like a machine.
(45:39):
It's a machine.
It's not just, you know,slinging plates.
It's different.
That is what is attractive to me.
Obviously, you love to see thefinished plate and microflowers and
it's built up and it's prettyand there's some sort of chemistry
involved or whatever.
Oh, that's awesome.
But how do you get that?
(46:00):
That's what tickles me.
I'm really interested in that.
John and I got to go toCamille in Orlando, and we got to
work with Chef Tung, who is a master.
This guy, he's a machine, alegit machine.
The clocks that are on thewall everywhere, the timing, all
(46:22):
of that to me is spectacularbecause I appreciate processes.
You see what we do here, right?
So there's processes to everything.
And if you can run throughyour processes and have something
beautiful at the end, you'rewinning oysters.
There's a process.
You're doing something special.
You're coming out with abeautiful product.
(46:42):
What you're doing at the restaurant.
Processes, beautiful product.
Missing recommendation.
I mean, you're using, youknow, Calusa oysters here, right?
So at the end of the day,these are the things that excite
me.
And that's what we'd like totalk about here on the show.
Are you ready for hurricane season?
Is anybody ever really readyfor hurricane season?
(47:03):
I mean, you know, I talked tomy insurance agent.
They think we're good.
You know, last Year wasbrutal, you know, and you don't know
what you don't know.
And I was probably a littleunderinsured going in there.
Again, I don't want to talkabout the insurance industry and
how expensive it's gotten hererecently, but especially in the state
of Florida.
But, yeah, I think that we're ready.
(47:24):
You know, we've got a goodplan, we've got a good contingency.
We know that we can fiteverything in the walk in and it'll
hold them for about 48 hours.
You know, outside of that, youknow, you say your prayers, you cross
your fingers and hope for the best.
How do you get prepared withan oyster farm for what you know
is going to be a busyhurricane season?
(47:46):
Well, first you pray a little bit.
So that's the big.
That's the big thing.
But for us, what we do, I'llsay the last year, the storms last
year helped us prepare andlearn things about the farm that
we had no idea about.
So they always say your farm,your location, will pick your gear
and how you farm and what yourprotocols are.
(48:07):
So for us, what we realized iswe have to get our densities down
as low as possible, as closeto harvest density amounts as quickly
as we possibly can.
Because if there is a storm,then our bags won't be overcrowded,
we won't have too many oystersin there growing.
And so if we can't go out foran extension, extended period of
time, if it's not safe towork, then we aren't coming out to
(48:28):
a mess that, you know, wedidn't plan for.
So that's our biggest thing isnow it's as quickly we can get it
down to that harvest size,that harvest density, we're going
to do that as quickly aspossible and then kind of a psa.
So today we're going to.
It's a Thursday, so nextWednesday we're going to get a whole
bunch of new seed in.
Don't say it.
So don't say it.
Every time.
(48:48):
The last three years we've hadhad six storms and one water spout
in the last 26 months.
So six names, hurricanes and stuff.
So we're putting seed out next Wednesday.
So I'm sure next Wednesdayplus 10 there will be a hurricane
that's not even on the maptree come out of nowhere.
But at least y' all ready.
So get your batteries, getyour waters.
Get prepared, you know.
(49:10):
You know, here's the thingabout it.
You've got.
You called it out on thisshow, you know, what that means.
We're safe.
Perfect.
We're safe.
Gentlemen, it was reallyawesome, spectacular to have you
in studio.
Both of you, the three of you.
Chef, how do we find you atthe Tides market?
Facebook, Instagram, TikTok?
(49:32):
We are @calusaoisterco onInstagram, and the website is calusaoisterco.com
Listen, I want to.
Thank Reed, Reed and Chef Johnfor being here today.
Hernandez, as always, man,like, with the photography, like,
strong.
Yeah, man.
You should do this for aliving or something, you know?
(49:52):
All right.
Appreciate y'.
All.
We are out.
Ra.
You've just stepped inside thewalk and talk, podcast number one
in the nation for food lovers,chefs, and storytellers.
I'm Carl Fiadini, your host,shining a light on the flavor, the
hustle, and the heart of the industry.
We're the official podcast forthe New York, California and Florida
restaurant shows, the PizzaTomorrow Summit, the US Culinary
Open at nafm, and the NorthAmerican media platform for the Burnt
(00:54):
Chef project, recorded at IbisImages Studios, where food photography
comes alive.
And I get that first bite.
Find out moreinfo@thewalkandtalk.com Today's guests
are.
Doing more than just feeding Florida.
They're helping define whatlocal seafood really means.
First, we've got Reed Smith,co owner of Colusa Oyster Company,
whose farm sits in the crystalclear waters off of Terracea Aquatic
(01:17):
Preserve in lower Tampa Bay.
Reed and his team arecultivating oysters with a deep respect
for sustainability, marinehealth, and Florida heritage, navigating
everything from hurricanes toharmful algal blooms to deliver a
clean, consistent product.
Chefs love one of those ChefsJohn Walker, co owner of the Tides
Market in Safey Harbor.
It's a chef driven marketmeats cafe that's become a community
(01:40):
favorite.
John and his wife, Mary Katehave created a space where Florida's
coastal ingredients, likeCalusa oysters shine across a seasonal
rotating menu that.
That just earned a Michelinguide recommendation.
So today we talk tide tables,Red tide raw bars, and what it takes
to build something lasting infood from farm to table.
(02:05):
Chef John, welcome.
Thanks for having me.
Pleasure's mine, man.
First of all, two beautiful dishes.
I wish there were more.
I'm just.
All I'm saying, there were more.
Yeah, I mean, here.
You just have to come to the shop.
No, I mean here.
All right, so you're doingsome really big things up in Safety
harbor, and I got toexperience some of that today.
(02:28):
Freaking amazing.
Can you tell the audienceyou're welcome?
Can you tell the audience what.
What you did?
Absolutely.
So we shucked some beautifulCalusa oysters, and then watermelon
is in season right now.
And I find that the.
The oysters in Tampa Bay arereally salty in a good way, but they
need something to kind of cuta little bit of that salt and add
(02:49):
a little bit of sweetness to it.
So we took watermelon, wepureed some watermelon meat.
We strained it off.
So got kind of got like awatermelon water, and then mix that
with a little champagnevinegar, some shallots, a little
mint, and just spoon that overthe top.
It's kind of A play on mignonettes.
And it was just what it needed.
And then, you know, again,celebrating oysters.
(03:09):
Oysters are probably.
I have a lot of favoritethings, and that's why we open the
Tides, because my wife and Ilove food.
So oysters are one of ourfavorite things.
And so I wanted to do something.
An oyster poway to me is thequintessential sandwich.
Right?
That's.
To me, it's.
It's the best.
But there's more that you cando with oysters.
And so we created a salad.
There's a lot of oyster saladsin and around New Orleans, which
(03:30):
I draw a lot of inspiration from.
And so what I wanted to do wascreate something that was purely
the tides based on friedoysters and a salad.
And so we did that with somehydroponic gem lettuce, some radishes,
tomatoes, a little blue cheeseand some bacon.
And then we made a buttermilk,smoked garlic dressing, dynamite.
(03:50):
It's kind of like ranch oncrack, but it really does the trick
for the salad.
Are you selling that at the market?
We are, we are.
And then the mignonettes, wehave a pretty standard mignonette
that we do with happy hour.
And then our oyster club, weget to play with different mignonettes
and just differentpreparations with oysters.
Gives us a little more freedom.
Are you an oyster house?
(04:12):
100%.
We do a very robust happy hourwith oysters.
It's a Buckishuck.
And then we've just introducedan oyster club which is higher end
oysters from the east and westcoast as well as southern waters.
Kind of very similar to whatReed's doing.
Anything out of the Gulf needsto be exactly the way Reed is raising
his oysters, because that'sthe way to do it then.
(04:33):
Yeah, we are very oysterforward, very local forward.
We're very Florida seafood forward.
How long have you been open?
Three and a half years.
Three and a half years.
But recently, what has it been?
The last year or so you've hadsome major waves, no puns intended.
A lot of action and activityaround your shop.
(04:54):
Yeah, absolutely.
You know, we've.
From day one, we had a prettystrict ethos about where we were
going to source products, howwe were going to source products,
and a standard for quality.
And we've just stayed behindthat and stayed true to ourselves
and just kept our head down.
You know, hard work pays off.
And I think that's why we'vegotten to where we are, is because
(05:16):
we have been unabashed in ourwork ethic.
And we just show up every dayand we try to be consistent in the
product that we put out.
We try to continually have newproducts in the market that will
draw people in.
And then having new productsin the market gives us a whole new
avenue for creativity, becausethen we can showcase those items
(05:37):
in the restaurant.
And so it's very much.
The restaurant supports the market.
The market supports the restaurant.
So it's this symbioticrelationship that we have.
And then you have this, like,nasty TikTok account.
Nasty, right.
Nasty TikTok that's supporting everything.
Absolutely.
TikTok social media.
How important is it in your business?
(06:00):
It's not that it's soimportant to our business.
It's what it's brought to light.
And I think that we've done areally good job of trying to demystify
fish and how to cook it, andthat's really where it all started.
And so we've had a lot ofpeople that have responded that they've
had a newfound confidence totry to cook fish at home, which obviously
(06:21):
we want that to happen.
We are a seafood market firstand foremost, before anything else.
We're a seafood market, andthat's where it all started.
And so if we can get people tofeel more comfortable cooking fish
at home, it's just going to begood for everybody.
I think that there.
There's definitely a bluemovement with farmed and cultivated
seafood, much like what Reedis doing, but across many different
(06:42):
species.
And so we're trying to bringthat to light as well.
And the TikTok has been greatbecause it's.
It's free, right?
I mean, it's free advertising.
You put stuff out there, it'scontent, and people are going to
consume it or they're not.
And that's been pretty widely consumed.
Yeah, you're getting million,million view posts and stuff, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's pretty impressive.
And it's crazy.
We've really upset most of Europe.
(07:06):
A lot of different countriesare not.
Italy's mad at me because Imake risotto the wrong way, and Holland
is mad because we don't domuscles the right way.
I mean, it's just there's allkinds of things that we have put
out there that people haveliked and people have not liked.
We're the.
We're the USA and we do it our way.
That's right.
That's.
Believe it or not, here we come.
This is what it is, you know?
All right, so you and Reed.
(07:28):
You and Reed are our besties.
Right.
And what makes before we bringhim on, why is his oyster so good?
Because he goes to work thesame way every day.
He has a way that he's goingto do things, and he's not going
to take any shortcuts.
He is going to make sure thatit's the best product.
(07:51):
Reid and I, he'll drop offoysters, and we'll talk for an hour
about diploids and triploids.
We'll talk about how thehurricanes have impacted and shaken
the cages, and you can kind ofsee rounded edges.
I mean, the.
The detail that this guy getsinto, you can tell that he loves
everything about it.
And that to me, it's.
It.
It's Reed, it's Theo, it'sEllen up at Little Pond, It's Roland
(08:17):
at LifeArms.
There's a group of people outthere that just have really high
standards for what they aretrying to put out.
And those are the people wewant to support.
Those are the people we getbehind every single time.
Well, Reed seems like a prettycool cat.
Yes.
We're talking like he's notactually a foot and a half away from
us.
He's watching.
He's right here.
Reed.
(08:38):
Yes.
Welcome to the show.
Thank you, my man.
Glad to be here.
Yeah.
We've had a lot ofconversations on the phone.
We have.
Yes.
Long ones.
Long ones, right.
So a conversation with me onthe phone, especially, like, in pregame
hour, two hours, stuff like that.
Sure.
And just for.
That's what it's like to hangout with Reed, though, because he's
that passionate about what he does.
(08:59):
It's what it is.
Yeah.
So we have Reed Senior andReed Junior, but not, like, related,
but just the way, you know, Ijust want to reference that there's
another Reed in the room.
Okay.
And there's actually two johnshere in the room and Chef Carl, where
the hell are you?
I needed here.
You know what I mean?
I needed balance, and you'renot here.
Reid, what makes Terracea the place?
(09:20):
Why.
Why are you growing or raising there?
Best thing we can say aboutit, it is in an aquatic preserve,
so there are no houses.
There is nothing around it tomuddy up, dirty up the waters.
So we're in the shadows of theSkyway bridge, which has tremendous
(09:40):
water flow.
So instead of stuff beingstagnant and, you know, like up in
Hillsborough Bay, which peoplemostly confuse with Tampa Bay, we
are out where we have atremendous water flow, so we get
tons of food.
So our oysters get a lot.
A lot of food to eat asopposed to somewhere that was stagnant,
where they're not getting asmuch food.
So we have crystal clear waterto begin with.
(10:01):
We can see the bottom usuallyabout 10ft deep on most days.
So people have no idea that wehave water in Tampa in the bay that's
that clear.
So it's really clean, reallyclean water and lots of food.
Most people understand thereason why somebody would open a
restaurant.
You know, they can wrap theirbrain around that.
(10:22):
I don't know that the averageperson is going to say, you know,
I'm thinking about, I don'tknow, an oyster farm.
How did you and your wife getinto this business?
Well, we were watchingsomething on TV during COVID and
we saw something on off bottomfarming for oysters.
And we both spent our wholelife in the, in the water.
(10:43):
We've been at the beach,diving, swimming, fishing, sailing,
everything.
So when the thought of havinga business that was, took place in
the water, it was kind of a no brainer.
And we had no walls, nowindows, nothing except for wind,
rain, sun and it's, it'sawesome out there.
(11:03):
Are you still diving now?
Are you still getting in theocean like that?
No, no, I, I'll snorkel.
My wife can dive.
But we have a, we have afriend who is a commercial diver
who has a commercial diving license.
He doesn't do it commerciallybut he does all our dive work for
us.
Reed does have a pretty wickedbackflip off the boat too.
Just for the record.
I am going to have to see thatand oh, there's video.
(11:23):
I'm going to, I'm bringing thecamera crew like we're going to,
we're going to make thishappen in a big way.
Is our only TikTok I think out.
There so well and I think thatreads being a little, I think he's,
he's not really kind ofputting to light how beautiful it
really is out there.
I mean I've been out once at atour of the farm and there's dolphins
and there's fish and there's turtles.
(11:44):
There's so much wildlife.
There's so much just life inthe water.
It's amazing.
What people probably don'tknow is the depth, how deep is, how,
how deep is the bed.
We are on average 8ft.
High tides can get as high as 10.
Low tides can get down to thelowest 6.
But so we are about a hundred,100 yards from us, it's 3ft.
(12:08):
So if the boat goes down wecan, as long as we can swim 100ft
then we can Stand.
So we're not really worriedabout drowning or anything like that,
especially we have guests on board.
But when I'm taller than himtoo, I just stand up.
You stand up.
Stand up.
That's like me.
Yeah.
Well, you can just bounce.
As long as you can bounce ineight feet of water, you can, you
can keep getting there.
So.
All right, 6ft of water, 8ftof water, 10ft of water, that's nothing.
(12:30):
But, you know, I've been.
I started diving when I wasabout 9, 8 or 9 years old with my
father.
And I know that there's,there's all kinds of stuff out there,
sharks and everything.
I mean, what's your experiences?
I mean, a lot of people aregoing to want to know that.
We really haven't seen any onthe farm.
We see everything.
Bait, sheephead, cobia, trout,all kinds of stuff.
(12:52):
But we did a sandbar dinnerabout two weeks ago on the night
of the solstice.
And so we had about 15, 20people out there.
We had set up tables out inthe sandbar.
Another restaurant, they, theydid all the food, all the cooking
and all the rest of that.
And right between the firstand second course.
So some of us were standingoff to the side on the pontoon boat
(13:13):
that brought everybody out there.
And all of a sudden we seesome fins, a pair of fins and then
a trailing fin about 3ftbehind it all in about 2ft of water.
So we made sure nobody lookedover where we were.
So we had sharks.
So the.
Nobody saw it, fortunately,but they were there.
So they are out there.
We see them sometimes going inand out.
(13:34):
Never seen them on the farm,fortunately, but we were concerned
some of those guests mighthave freaked out.
Yeah, it's probably a hammer too.
I bet you there are a lot ofbonnet head sharks out there.
And then either nurse shark,if that's the nerf shark, I don't
think that's really dangerous one.
We've seen some of those likesix footer, seven footers in the
(13:54):
terrace and.
Most of them don't bother you anyway.
But it's still creepy.
It's still a creepy thing.
It's cool to see.
It's still creepy though.
It is.
That's great.
Yeah.
How deep is it in the sandbar?
So I mean, how much of thesandbars underwater?
When we got out there, becausesalsa's been the longest day of the
year, the tides wereabsolutely perfect.
So we got there at about fourand it was just creeping out of the
(14:17):
water and the tides slowlycame in the rest of the night.
So it started where your feetwere in the water and then it got
below your.
Below the knee.
So just mid calf.
So it came in.
It's.
But it's a two tide day, soit's a real long, long incoming.
That sounds pretty cool.
I mean, how many courses?
How many courses?
I wasn't invited.
He wasn't.
Sorry, I can't say.
Same time he was in Ecuador,so he was visiting a Galapagos.
(14:40):
But we did five courses andthen we had an appetizer course.
How often are you doing that?
We did it with the restaurantwe're doing in conjunction with.
We.
That was the first one.
It went off really, really well.
Fortunately.
It could have been an epicdisaster, an epic success.
And epic success was what we got.
Perfect sunset.
I mean, it was.
It was framed.
The skyway in the background.
(15:01):
It couldn't.
It's exactly like.
We drew it up like we hoped.
We hoped, we expected it would be.
So I don't know if they'veannounced it publicly, but I'll write
them out now.
It's.
We plan another one forSeptember 5th.
So it'll be announced on our.
Is that our formal invitation?
Is that what we're hearing?
Yeah, Yep, exactly.
He was looking at me in the eye.
(15:22):
He made eye contact.
I saw it, you know, September 5th.
So they haven't.
I don't think it's been publicyet, but I'll go and say.
Because we booked it.
So I think you got four trickat Solar.
I think here we're in.
No guarantee on the sharks, though.
That could be dolphins.
Real quick side story, I wasdiving from about 8 to about 18.
(15:44):
And the last time I wasfishing, we were on my dad's boat
and we were way out, way out.
We were trolling and it washot as.
Just hot, just super hot.
Hot as what?
Hot as hell.
And so, you know, he powersdown and.
And we jump in the water.
We're just hanging out, youknow, I'm hanging on the.
On the back of the boat andjust dangling there, you know, and
(16:05):
the lines start to.
To fall or whatever.
And I don't know, 15 minutesin the line hit like.
And it just went.
I was.
We jump in the boat and I'mmaybe £160, something like that.
And I'm like, pop, this is.
You know, it's as it'sgetting, you know, it's getting out
(16:28):
there.
I give it to pull to my fatherand he gives me the gaff and I'm
looking over the side and,and, and it Was about eight feet.
This, it was a mako and, andit just.
No thanks.
Yeah, well, so it got, luckilyit, it broke the line, right, because
it got up to the side of theboat and I'm with the gaff and I'm
just looking at this thinglike it's way bigger than me.
(16:49):
I'm like, holy crap.
And as I was getting thecajones to, you know, it broke off
thankfully.
But after then I thought tomyself, first of all, never getting
into blue water ever again.
Like never again is that happening.
And then I.
No, no, no.
I just, I lost my, my spiritfor it.
Well, we were that we werefishing on the Boca grand when we
(17:12):
were in high school.
We in a 17 foot Mako and we'reon this sunken shrimp boat and a
hammerhead that was, and I'mnot an exaggerator, it was as long
as the boat.
The dorsal fin was so tallthat it, that it bent over.
It couldn't support the weightof its own self.
And we looked at my friend andI looked at each other and said to
Wilson, I was like, holy crap,we might be in trouble here.
(17:35):
Fortunately, this guy who, whofishes for sharks came out, hooked
him right away.
We, we pulled the anchor like,see you.
Good luck, Armando.
Have fun with that.
We got out of there.
But when this fin went by andit was way by the side of the boat
and it was, was bent over thetop because it couldn't support its
weight, that was.
Made you think twice aboutbeing out there.
I don't care what anybodysays, that's intimidating.
(17:58):
And you know what the fact is,is yeah, you know, pet its head and
push it over and tickle its belly.
Nah, forget about it.
What are we talking about here?
Get me out.
Get me out.
I mean the hammerhead is just,the look of that is just even more
menacing.
Truth be told.
True.
I will say, like it's reallynot an aggressive.
Like they don't typically,you're not going to get attacked
by a hammerhead or a school of them.
(18:20):
You know, that's not the one typically.
But when you see them and likeeven if I saw a little five foot
nurse shark or something likethat, I'm gonna still be a little
like, I don't care.
I'm not afraid to say it.
I'm man enough to say it.
So I grew up on the east coastand we used to catch spinner sharks
and you would hook them likeright in the surf.
You'd be in a boat and fishingthe, the beach.
(18:41):
Right.
And so you catch these spinnersharks, and they would run towards
the beach and they would jumpout of the water and they would spin
or do like a little verticalrotate or whatever.
And so I remember hooking intoone of them and, like, he was running
towards the beach, and therewas like this little family of four
swimming right in the breakwater.
And his shark was likebreaking water.
(19:02):
And these four people, I swearthey got on top of the water and
ran out.
So it doesn't have to be bluewater either.
I know I'm.
I'm much braver in the shallows.
No, even I know.
I get it.
I understand.
But it's different.
It's still different.
It's the shark's house.
It's the shark house.
Yeah, it is.
You know, we gotta live somewhere.
(19:23):
But, yeah, you're right.
You know, that's where they live.
Chef, you're from Miami, andyou somehow made your way to New
Orleans.
What was that experience like?
And the reason I'm asking isone of our brethren, our walk and
talk brethren, is Put Rivera,which I know, I told him about this,
and he wanted to be here today.
He's in New Orleans.
He was going to come out.
The schedule wasn't.
(19:43):
Wasn't right.
But what.
How was your experience thereand what made you leave?
So I was 18 when I moved toNew Orleans and was ill prepared
to live on my own as an adult,going to college for the first time.
And so I went to Loyola in NewOrleans for two years, and they politely
asked me to reevaluate mypriorities and maybe come back in
(20:03):
a semester.
So I was out of school and Istarted cooking.
And it was amazing.
I mean, what a great place togo and learn a craft.
Not to mention that I wouldwork from 2 in the afternoon until
midnight and then drink dollarbeers and listen to just incredible
music until dawn every day.
So it was an incredible experience.
(20:24):
You know, I did a lot of things.
You know, I worked for free.
There were events and thingswhere, you know, I wanted to learn
how to do something that Chefwas doing at whatever restaurant
I was working at.
And so it was a reallyincredible experience where I got
to do a lot of things that I'dnever done before, seen a lot of
things that I'd never seen before.
I started in restaurants whenI was like, 14.
I had to get a work permitfrom the school I was going to and
(20:46):
bus and tables and that kindof thing.
So to be in a differentposition where I was actually getting
to create things was.
It really sparked something inme, you know, I think it's, I've
still got that spark.
So it's really been a lastingexperience that I draw on to this
day.
Reid, take us through atypical day on the water.
(21:07):
Well, it starts early so weusually get up 4:45 5:00am we drive
about an hour to get to wherewe keep the boat stored.
So since we're in this aquaticpreserve, there's no commerce, there's
no working waterfront.
So everything we have to traileverything in, trailer everything
out.
We don't have a dock we canpull up to unfortunately.
So we get there, load the boatup, drive it, put it in the water.
(21:31):
That's usually about, about6:30 in the morning when we're getting,
or 6:30 to 7 we're getting inthe water.
We take a slow ride throughNoeg zone through just a beautiful,
beautiful mangrove protected bay.
We have in the wintertime wehave some awesome white pelicans.
When they come down, they'reall over.
It's really cool to see them.
We see all kind.
We see dolphins feeding so inthe spring they're teaching their
(21:54):
little pups how to eat.
So sometimes we'll see themknock fish out of the, out of the
air, in the air and you know,to stun them and then little ones
eat.
So we just, so we go throughjust beautiful country, getting out
there, slow wake.
And then once we break themangroves up there, then it's about
a short five minute ride tothe farm.
So when we get, once we get tothe farm we kind of on the way out,
(22:14):
Reid and I figure out kind ofwhat we're going to do for the day,
reassess if something'schanged, if we have a speeded up
harvest or something extra weneed to do.
And we kind of talked aboutwhat we're going to do.
So we get out there and wehook up the boat to one of the lines
and then get to work.
So we, we have cages that, soour cages, they have our bags where
all the oysters are, theyfloating the surface.
(22:34):
So what we'll do is we'll pullthose up and then depending on what
time of day and what time ofyear and what we've done the last
couple weeks, we'll pull eachof those bags out and sometimes we'll
put them through a tumblerwhich is a big machine, it has a
long tube which is a wholebunch of whole perforations in it.
And what they do is we'll,we'll dump them through that well,
the, the tumbler will Tumble.
It will help break the edge ofthe shells, because end of an oyster
(22:57):
shell is like a finger.
So they'll break off.
And when they, when that stuffbreaks off, it kind of induces the
oysters to kind of grow more deep.
So they put their effort intogrowing where they can grow that
shell.
And so you keep.
The edges keep getting knockedoff, then they can grow deeper, and
that gives that deeper cupthat everyone likes, because then
you have.
When you have great water,there's more water in that rather
than a flat oyster.
(23:18):
So then it gets a lot more flavor.
So it grows in there.
So we're running through that tumbler.
So the big ones will get tothe end, the small ones will drop
through the holes and they'llend up in a tub.
So that's how we separate them.
So we'll store them by size,and then the.
And then that they'll kind ofhelp them form and shape and get
to the end.
And then we'll separate themout and put them back in the bags.
And then we put them.
Then we'll put those.
(23:38):
Those bags back in the cageand put them down and move to the
next one, separate and sort them.
Would that be considered your.
Your quality control?
Is that.
How is.
Is that like the genesis ofwhat makes a great oyster?
It's consistent.
Yeah.
So when we get out there, theother thing people don't realize
is think they see an oysterout of water, think that's like the
kiss of death when it actually isn't.
(23:59):
What it does is it helps ouroysters out of the water.
It helps kill any kind ofparasites, anything, barnacles, anything
that's growing on them that'sgoing to make the shell not as pretty
or just cause an issue.
Like there's some things thatcan drill into the shell.
So when they're out of waterfor a period of time, no more than
24 hours, and that helps kill things.
So that's kind of qualitycontrol there.
We put them in the tumbler.
(24:20):
So what that does is, youknow, all oyster farms, most all
oyster farms will use a tumbler.
And what that does, it helpsnot only sort, but helps work on
that shell, creating thatshell that all the restaurants and
a lot of people like.
So those are the kind of thetwo big quality control.
But the other thing is justgetting out there and doing it every,
every day.
So we're out there and wetouch our oysters.
We'll probably touch themtwice a month.
(24:41):
So on average, 24.
20 to 24 times before they're harvested.
So it's.
There's a lot of.
There's a.
There's a lot of touching, alot of feeling, a lot of, you know,
massaging kind of what's.
Where they are, what they're in.
And so the big thing for us,we found is when we do that sorting,
it's really important becausewe need to keep the density in the
bags low, and that's where wetry and keep it about 150.
(25:02):
That way they get plenty of water.
They're not fighting for food.
(25:37):
So when you see one of thoselong, skinny oysters, that's meaning
they were clumped up with abunch of other ones.
Whether it's a wild oyster orsomething else, that means somebody
had their bags were too.
There were two dents or toomany in there, because those oysters
are searching for food.
So they're trying to findwhere they can get fresh water.
It's kind of like grass.
You know, grass towards the sun.
Moisture will grow towardswherever that water flows for them
to get oyster.
So we try and make sure we'reout there.
(25:59):
We can try and tumble them,try and work them as.
As much as possible, as muchas Mother Nature and Poseidon will
let us get out there and do it.
Chef John, what doesconsistency in oysters mean from
a chef's perspective?
I mean, we want.
It's tough, too, with the wild product.
It's a. I mean, I say wild,but it's.
Obviously, you're farmingthem, Reed, but it.
It's still a wild product atthe end of.
(26:21):
And so consistency for me isprobably going to be a little bit
different for.
Than other chefs.
What I'm looking for is theright size, the right meat to shell
ratio.
Those edges that Reed keepstalking about, it's.
That's hugely important.
If I get a bag of oystersthat's got really sharp edges on
it, I know that there hasn'tbeen a lot of care taking in them.
(26:44):
And so that's what we'relooking for.
We're looking at the same waywhen we check in fish.
You know, you're looking forclear eyes, red gills for meat, that
kind of thing.
With oysters, I'm lookingreally a really tight seal between
the shells.
I'm looking to make sure thatthe edges aren't too sharp.
I'm looking to see if there'sa good.
What did you call it?
A elbow.
(27:04):
That.
That joint right there.
I want to make sure that I canget a knife in there.
There's a hinge.
The hinge?
Yeah.
Thank you.
You know that those are what,those are the things that I'm looking
for in a consistent oyster.
You know, the other thing thatI'll say is, is that I have an outlet
for, for those oysters thatReed has with the barnacles and things
like that.
We do a dollar oyster at theshop and, you know, that's where
(27:26):
those oysters are key.
There really isn't anythingthat Reed could bring me that I wouldn't
be happy with.
We call those hurricaneoysters because there were lots of
times in weeks where weweren't able to get out and work
them as much as possible.
So things grew on them.
You can, you know, it'sreally, really hard to stay ahead
of them.
So the hurricanes prevented uswhere there were a couple weeks at
a time when we couldn't go outand do it.
(27:47):
So when those things are onthere, it's a lot of work to get
them clean.
Because when we deliver anoyster, I don't think if we're getting
a luxury product, a high endproduct, I don't think you should
have to do much work to it.
You shouldn't have to cleanit, you shouldn't have to do a lot
of work.
It should be pretty much pullout of the bag and serve.
So we spend a lot of timetrying cleaning and stuff when there
are things that do grow on it.
So for like, for John'sactually, if there's some.
(28:08):
He's like, you know, we needsome happier oysters.
If we have that, then we know,hey, that's great.
We can get him more withouthaving to do a lot of work to it.
So.
Well, and I'm.
One of my favorite movies isWhite Men Can't Jump.
And there's a line in thatmovie that says that I would rather
win first and look good second.
And to me, that's what it'sabout with oysters, right?
It's that meat to shell ratio helpful.
(28:29):
Is that oyster, when you openit, is it spawned out?
Is it real loose and liquidyor is it firm and full of meat?
You know, that's, that's whatI'm talking.
You win first with the meatand then there's the look.
So are you able to eyeball aCalusa oyster?
Yep.
You can tell which.
You can tell that's.
Yeah, that's a colossus.
(28:50):
That's reeds.
We have four to six, sevenoysters on hand at any one time.
We're probably going throughfive or six thousand oysters a week.
So, yeah, I can by Sight I cantell you the oysters that we use
a lot of like reeds.
I can pick those out of a.
Crab, no problem, especiallyhis reed rent hide and hurricanes.
(29:11):
It was a tough season last year.
Talk about it.
Well, we've kind of beenknown, I'm kind of known some places
now as Mr. Red Tide because wewere, we were shut down for seven
months to harvesting.
So what that says is the statedoes a very, very good job of monitoring
the water.
(29:31):
And if the red tide level isjust above, kind of not there at
all, then they shut us downfor harvest.
And in some ways that sucks.
We always say we have anotherterm red tide sucks.
But what it does, it makes it,it protects the consumer on, on the
tail end.
So oysters are the most highlyregulated protein in the country.
(29:54):
So our oysters are temped fromwhen they, when they come on the
boat till they go in a cooler,till they leave the cooler, till
they get to a restaurant.
So when the red tide, when thered tide happens, you know, the state
is checking every single week.
So it's unfortunate when thatstuff happens.
We have to close.
But it's from a protection standpoint.
So, you know, if you'relooking at business, you think, how
(30:14):
can I go seven months?
Or how to, you know, why wouldyou want to visit, go seven months
without, without any sales?
Well, it sucks there as well.
But what it's done is itcaused us to look at other options
in order to mitigate, to addresiliency to what we're doing.
So there's a thing, wetstorage, that most people are familiar
with and don't realize it.
But the old days, if you'reold enough, you've seen lobsters
(30:37):
and tanks, and they will.
Grocery stores, that's a wetstorage facility.
On a small scale, what thatdoes is it preserves that living
animal in time before it'sharvested, meaning you take it home
and cook it.
So what we're looking at is.
And they do it in the westcoast and some.
A couple places in Canada.
So it's nothing new.
It's just.
It hasn't been approved.
No one's been approved for itin Florida.
(30:58):
So they're larger, large,large tanks with filtered water.
It continues to run through it.
So what we'll be able to do iswhen we get that facility up and
running, we'll be able to putthose oysters in that, in that tank.
And so that filtered waterwill help purge any red tide, any
toxins, anything that's in thewater that's undesirable that would
make it unsafe in the state'seyes to take to market.
(31:20):
So we'll put it in there.
It'll be in there for three orfour days, generally.
That's kind of the regulationsright now.
And then eventually afterabout a week, we'll probably do it
a little longer than the statewill come in and test that meat from
it.
And then if they say that'sgood, then we can harvest.
So instead of being able to beclosed for seven months, we won't.
We wouldn't have a closure at all.
We just harvest, put in thetanks, let it clean, and then.
(31:40):
And harvest it.
So that's a big thing we'relooking into.
And we're planning on workingon Moat Marine down in Sarasota.
They have built a facility andthey worked on some of the regulations,
getting them approved for the state.
So we were.
We'll work with them, too, onthe tank, build out and all the rest
of that.
And they may be able to helpout with some manpower to help monitor
and do some of the things thatwe need to do for that.
(32:01):
So that's a big thing.
So that would mitigate allthose issues, and we'd be.
We'd be able to work inharvest year round.
I think he's being a littlemodest, though, because the program
that he just laid out is notjust for him, though.
I mean, he's working on it forlike a.
Like a working waterfront sothat it can be something that helps
everybody in Florida.
And that's one of the thingsabout Reid, too, is that this isn't
(32:21):
a selfish.
A selfish endeavor for him.
It's not just about sellingoysters and making money.
I mean, he has to do that.
But there's also a greatergood that he's working on for all
of the shellfish farmers inthe state.
So he.
He kind of needs a round ofapplause for that, too.
Oh, yeah.
Right on, Chef.
What you're saying, I mean,part of the conversation, one of
(32:42):
our conversations that we had.
Reed, you're going to explainit better than I can, but ultimately
you're going to get politicalwith this.
How so?
The, like, anything, once youget into something, you realize there's
a whole lot more to it.
So if you, like six monthsago, you had asked me, hey, are you
going to be involved inpolitics, anything, lobbying, anything
on those levels, I would havesaid, heck, no.
All I just want to do is Ijust want to farm and, you know,
(33:05):
grow oysters for people andsell them.
But as we've gotten involvedin this.
We found that in order to getworking on this wet, wet storage
facility, we're going to needcounty approval, a bunch of them,
state approval.
We're going to need supportfrom fwc, the FDACS people, a whole
lot of people around the statein order to come together to help
that.
And a lot of that that comeswith it, as well as research and
(33:26):
other things.
And then so that researchthing gets into national stuff.
So the usda, they have adivision that of aquaculture, of
support and research hasdevoted a little bit of.
A little bit of support andfunding to.
But there's not an office ofaquaculture at the usda.
And when the storms comethrough, we found that there was
no insurance for us.
(33:47):
There's no insurance or ourequipment or anything else really.
So there is sometimes.
Sometimes there's governmentsupport for.
In a disaster effort.
But aquaculture is notconsidered agriculture in the way
that, you know that astrawberry farm would be or a blueberry
farm or something like that.
So what we're.
One thing we're working on,and we were lobbying DC with, is
(34:07):
to create an office ofaquaculture at the USDA.
Be about 14 people.
But what that does is it wouldconsolidate three or four different
places that you have to go tofor either support or aid or research
and all the rest of the stuffand put it all in one spot.
Aquaculture is kind of theredheaded stepchild.
It's getting bigger.
So it's more and more important.
(34:28):
I think everybody we talk toin D.C. from our senators from Florida
up there, they understand thenature of the blue food economy and
how it can.
How it really needs to growand needs support in that case.
So they are really behind that.
So we've started to deal with that.
And then there's another thingI never thought I'd know and never
(34:48):
thought I'd need to know, butthere is hazardous.
There are hazardous importsthat come in from shellfish from
all over the world.
And you can imagine where mostof them probably come from.
There are contaminants in there.
There are harmful algal blooms.
There's PFAs.
There's a whole bunch of otherstuff that comes in and they look
at it as, oh, well, it can becooked out.
Well, most of that stuff can'tbe cooked out.
So right now that there isnobody at the FDA that is allowed
(35:11):
to destroy harmful imports.
So if those things come in,basically what they do is turn around,
send them back.
They don't have the power todestroy them, so they go back to
the country of origin.
And they'll either relabelthem as like office parts or something
like that, or machineequipment, or send them to another
country and send them in,because then only 2% of the containers
that come and get checked.
So that's another thing westarted working on is like realize
(35:34):
like, hey, you can't cook thisstuff out.
So if something's comingintended to be cooked, they don't
check it because they think isit's, oh, it's going to be cooked
out.
Well, it's not, and it's goingto be bad.
So that's getting helping FDAhave that approval and that ability
to destroy it right theninstead of shipping it back.
And then God knows what theydo to it when it comes back.
So those are some of thethings we've gotten had to get involved
(35:55):
with.
Chef, do you prefer oystersfrom the Gulf of America or elsewhere?
Well, the interesting thing isthat in the Gulf, it's the same species
of oyster from Canada all theway down the east coast, around Florida
(36:17):
and through the Gulf ofAmerica and down around into Texas.
It's all the same species.
It's the body of water thatit's pulled from that makes a difference.
It's the salinity, it's theminerality, it's the maroir, if you
will, of that oyster, whichgives it its flavor.
(36:38):
So I have some favorites in Canada.
I have some favorites on theWest Coast.
I have some favorites inFlorida and along the Gulf Coast.
So they're all different.
So which one is better, Gulfof America or Gulf of Mexico?
I'm going to have to go withthe Gulf of Mexico on that one.
Just saying.
TikTok, you know where he resides?
(36:59):
That's right at the Tides Market.
Come get me.
How did you two connect?
So, look, we're digging deepinto a lot of interesting angles
of, you know, aquaculture and oysters.
But at the end of the day,we've had some colorful, fun jokes
(37:20):
and conversation here todayduring production.
How did you guys meet?
You guys are made for eachother, by the way.
Yeah, I.
We were kind of talking aboutthat earlier.
We don't exactly know how we met.
It just sort of happened one day.
Yeah, I think we concocted ouridea about the same time that they
concocted their tides idea.
So we had to get a lot ofregulatory stuff and get a final
(37:44):
lease and find the space inthe water.
So we weren't officially inbusiness at that point.
We were planning and gettingready for it.
And I think I was.
I was.
I don't know how I came acrossit, but I saw it and either John
may have sent something to usbecause I didn't do TikTok, I didn't
do any social media of anysort until we did had to do this
and obviously it's very important.
(38:04):
So he's right now either I sawhim and I was like, oh, I'm go by.
I think I probably saw theirTikTok or their Instagram account.
I was like, I'm going to go bythere and just cold called and walked
in there.
Yeah.
And I think I may have reachedout to you on Instagram at some point
too.
Yeah.
But one day it was just I wasat the seafood counter and he was
on the other side and we juststarted talking and the next thing
(38:27):
I know he, he said dumb thenoiser farmer.
And I was like, well, allright then let's, yeah, come over
here, let's talk a littlewhile longer.
And I think they, and when wefirst went in there, high quality
stuff is very important to me.
I really appreciate so allthe, everything they carried at the
time, they had pots and pansand a whole bunch of other stuff
was really, really high end.
It was all really good quality.
(38:47):
And so, and my wife knows likeif we're going to be associated or
sell a place, we want to be apartner who, we want to be in business
with them.
And so I think we startedtalking and just about our process
and how if it's not ready,it's not ready.
If it's not right, it's not right.
We don't want to do it if itfirst year, they don't come out looking
great and all these sorts of things.
So I think we are talkingabout our plan for equality and making
(39:11):
sure that it's right and it'sgood and high end because it's just,
you know, I don't want to beassociated with something that's
really kind of low in.
And you know, at that pointwe're going to put all the work into
it.
So then you could tell by thequality products they had in there
from the meat and the case andeverything else that this was, they
were serious about it anddoing it at a high end.
So chef, how do you build aseasonal dish around an oyster?
(39:35):
If I'm being honest with mywife's permission, Reed, you know
my wife.
I've heard that.
No, I mean it's, it's, it'slike anything else.
I mean an oyster to me is,it's, there's There's a lot that
you can do with it.
And I think that that's thething that people.
(39:55):
That people always kind of goback to the dozen raw, you know,
but there's so much more to anoyster, and there's so many different.
Again, it's the maroir.
So it's.
Every oyster is a little bit different.
Every oyster's got a story.
So in and of itself, anoyster's pretty inspirational.
And so it doesn't matter ifyou're shucking a calusa, a beausoleil,
a kumamoto, a blonde.
(40:16):
They all have their own characteristics.
They all have their own way.
And so for me, it's just amatter of finding things that are
in season that I think mighttaste good with them.
It's really not hard.
And my wife really is the boss.
Just getting that didn't.
Eric, what does it mean tohave earned a Michelin recommendation?
(40:38):
Oh, my gosh.
That I am still blown away tobe in the company of those other
chefs and restaurateurs.
I am completely humbled.
I am.
It's just surreal.
It's been tremendous for the business.
It's been so validating forthe work that we put into it, that.
(41:02):
Yeah, it's tough to put thatone into words.
And being at that event whereit was all announced and the red
carpet and the.
You know, it was just.
It was mind blowing.
Being in the room with thesepeople that I looked up to for so
long and been to theserestaurants and so admired their
cuisine, and I'm in the sameroom with these guys and gals.
(41:24):
It was truly something otherworldly.
You know, a lot of chefs havedifferent opinions on.
On Michelin in general.
Since you got therecommendation, has your opinion
changed of Michelin from before?
Is it the same?
Do you.
You know, is it deeper?
I wanted Michelin to come toPinellas county, where we are.
(41:45):
They've been in Tampa for alittle while.
And so Mary Kate and I had hadthe conversation like, we need to
do something with.
Visit St. Pete, Clearwater, orwith a tourism board.
We need to figure out how toget Michelin to Pinellas County.
Not for us.
That was never the goal.
But the goal was, was to bringto light these people that are doing
a great job.
(42:05):
We weren't chasing Michelin.
We weren't.
You know, I applied for aJames Beard award, you.
You know, fill out anapplication and that kind of thing.
And I did that last year, youknow, more of just to kind of test
the waters.
But my opinion has not changedon Michelin you know, there are anonymous
inspectors that go into theseplaces, right.
Like it's, it's the real deal.
(42:26):
Like they don't mess aroundand they find people that are doing
the right things because it'sthe right thing to do and consistently
executing those visions.
And so, yeah, it's, it hasn'tchanged the way that I've looked
at anything.
It's validated the hard workthat we put in and makes us want
to work that much harder.
We've got a recommendationthis year and so.
(42:48):
Well, we weren't chasing Michelin.
I mean, I'm definitely pushingthe envelope now and trying to, to
do more and create more valuefor our guests and just continue
to try to push the envelopeand move us forward.
Do you have the staff to do that?
Yeah, that's the, I meanthat's really.
(43:10):
The, that's the biggest thingis the, it's all the ancillary players
right in the, in therestaurant, the whole restaurant.
And they can't be there opento close every day, nor do I want
to be.
I've got three kids I want toraise and I'm going to spend time
with my wife and do other things.
But yeah, we've got somereally great people.
One of the best things we didthis year was hire a general manager
and she has come in andabsolutely maintained our standards
(43:32):
and elevated our service.
You know, it is everything.
It is how clean the bathroomis and deserve trash on the floor
and can you see, you know,messy service stations and things
like that.
So, yeah, I think on the frontof the house side we've definitely
elevated things in the back ofthe house we've got a couple of animals
back there that have embracedour standards and pushed us even
(43:56):
further from an hourly position.
So, yeah, long answer is,yeah, our staff is there, they're
bought in.
When we got therecommendation, we had cookies made
with the Michelin emblem onthem and we, Mary Kate wrote a note
to every single person on thestaff and said, thank you so much
for your hard work.
(44:16):
We wouldn't be here without you.
And I think that's really.
It's that culture that we're,we're building and developing that
is going to help us maintainand get us to the next level.
We'll never be a star kind of place.
We just want to stay on theguide and we want to stay true to
who we are and that helps.
Them attract talent and retaintalent in a situation like that.
(44:37):
So they're known, appreciated.
There are people who've beenthere since Day one that the first
time I walked in there thatare still there, you know, and restaurants.
That's Robert can't go anywhere.
He's my brother in law.
Yeah.
And Miranda, I think Miranda'sstill out.
Right.
So Miranda was there for helping.
So it's a place where peoplelike and want to be there.
And if you're there to cook inthe kitchen, you're like, hey, this
is a place that I want to be.
(44:58):
I'm going to get recognized orwhat I'm doing here is going to matter
to people so well.
And the cooks get to usereally great ingredients.
You know, it's domesticgrouper and snapper.
It's high end sushi, tuna and salmon.
I mean, they enjoy working.
I've had a couple cooks thathave left other places because they
weren't proud of the productthey were serving.
(45:19):
Part of what attracts me tobeards or Michelin establishments,
it's the workflow, it's thecleanliness, and it's the cleanliness
during the work and howeverybody has to be on board with
that.
Because now you're talkingabout, like a machine.
(45:39):
It's a machine.
It's not just, you know,slinging plates.
It's different.
That is what is attractive to me.
Obviously, you love to see thefinished plate and microflowers and
it's built up and it's prettyand there's some sort of chemistry
involved or whatever.
Oh, that's awesome.
But how do you get that?
(46:00):
That's what tickles me.
I'm really interested in that.
John and I got to go toCamille in Orlando, and we got to
work with Chef Tung, who is a master.
This guy, he's a machine, alegit machine.
The clocks that are on thewall everywhere, the timing, all
(46:22):
of that to me is spectacularbecause I appreciate processes.
You see what we do here, right?
So there's processes to everything.
And if you can run throughyour processes and have something
beautiful at the end, you'rewinning oysters.
There's a process.
You're doing something special.
You're coming out with abeautiful product.
(46:42):
What you're doing at the restaurant.
Processes, beautiful product.
Missing recommendation.
I mean, you're using, youknow, Calusa oysters here, right?
So at the end of the day,these are the things that excite
me.
And that's what we'd like totalk about here on the show.
Are you ready for hurricane season?
Is anybody ever really readyfor hurricane season?
(47:03):
I mean, you know, I talked tomy insurance agent.
They think we're good.
You know, last Year wasbrutal, you know, and you don't know
what you don't know.
And I was probably a littleunderinsured going in there.
Again, I don't want to talkabout the insurance industry and
how expensive it's gotten hererecently, but especially in the state
of Florida.
But, yeah, I think that we're ready.
(47:24):
You know, we've got a goodplan, we've got a good contingency.
We know that we can fiteverything in the walk in and it'll
hold them for about 48 hours.
You know, outside of that, youknow, you say your prayers, you cross
your fingers and hope for the best.
How do you get prepared withan oyster farm for what you know
is going to be a busyhurricane season?
(47:46):
Well, first you pray a little bit.
So that's the big.
That's the big thing.
But for us, what we do, I'llsay the last year, the storms last
year helped us prepare andlearn things about the farm that
we had no idea about.
So they always say your farm,your location, will pick your gear
and how you farm and what yourprotocols are.
(48:07):
So for us, what we realized iswe have to get our densities down
as low as possible, as closeto harvest density amounts as quickly
as we possibly can.
Because if there is a storm,then our bags won't be overcrowded,
we won't have too many oystersin there growing.
And so if we can't go out foran extension, extended period of
time, if it's not safe towork, then we aren't coming out to
(48:28):
a mess that, you know, wedidn't plan for.
So that's our biggest thing isnow it's as quickly we can get it
down to that harvest size,that harvest density, we're going
to do that as quickly aspossible and then kind of a psa.
So today we're going to.
It's a Thursday, so nextWednesday we're going to get a whole
bunch of new seed in.
Don't say it.
So don't say it.
Every time.
(48:48):
The last three years we've hadhad six storms and one water spout
in the last 26 months.
So six names, hurricanes and stuff.
So we're putting seed out next Wednesday.
So I'm sure next Wednesdayplus 10 there will be a hurricane
that's not even on the maptree come out of nowhere.
But at least y' all ready.
So get your batteries, getyour waters.
Get prepared, you know.
(49:10):
You know, here's the thingabout it.
You've got.
You called it out on thisshow, you know, what that means.
We're safe.
Perfect.
We're safe.
Gentlemen, it was reallyawesome, spectacular to have you
in studio.
Both of you, the three of you.
Chef, how do we find you atthe Tides market?
Facebook, Instagram, TikTok?
(49:32):
We are @calusaoisterco onInstagram, and the website is calusaoisterco.com
Listen, I want to.
Thank Reed, Reed and Chef Johnfor being here today.
Hernandez, as always, man,like, with the photography, like,
strong.
Yeah, man.
You should do this for aliving or something, you know?
(49:52):
All right.
Appreciate y'.
All.
We are out.
Ra.
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