Description

“Part treatise, component miscellany, unfailingly entertaining.”–The Ny Times “A little gem of the guide. . . An excellent account of the development of the modern town as viewed through the rise and fall of the lowly oyster.”–Rocky Hill NewsAward-winning author Mark Kurlansky shows the amazing history of New York by following a flight of 1 of its most intriguing inhabitants–the oyster.For generations New York was well-known for this specific seafood, which before early 1900s performed such a prominent a job in the city’s existence the considerable bivalves were Gotham’s most famed move, a staple food for all courses, and an all-natural filtration for the city’s busy waterways.Filled with social, historic, and culinary insight–along with historical recipes, maps, sketches, and photos–this powerful story sweeps readers from the seventeenth-century beginning of Ny for the demise of its oyster beds and the increase of America’s environmentalist action, from the oyster cellars of the rough-and-drop Five Factors slums to Manhattan’s Gilded Age eating chambers.