Bluff Oysters

Bluff oysters are dredged from Foveaux Strait, the cold and frequently rough water between the South Island and Stewart Island, and landed at Bluff, a working port at the bottom of the country. They are a flat native oyster, rounder and far stronger in flavour than the farmed Pacific ones, and the season runs from March into August under a quota. Most are eaten raw, or lightly crumbed and fried at a fish shop. The town holds an oyster festival in May that sells out well ahead of the day. The fishery has had a long fight with a parasite that periodically cuts the quota, so price and supply both move year to year.

What you actually see

• Bluff itself - the port, the fishing fleet and the road end at Stirling Point.
• Oysters raw - eaten straight from the shell, the way most locals argue for.
• Crumbed and fried - the other standard, sold at fish shops through the season.
• The May festival - a one-day oyster and food event in the town, ticketed and sold out early.

When to go

The season opens in March and closes at the end of August, and the first weeks bring the highest prices and the most fuss. May and June are the sweet spot for supply. Outside the season, anything sold as a Bluff oyster is frozen or something else. Festival tickets in May need buying months in advance.

Honest expectations

They are expensive, sometimes startlingly so, and the flavour is strong, metallic and soft in texture, which not everyone enjoys after paying for it. Bluff is a small industrial port with little laid on beyond the seafood and the signpost at Stirling Point. Weather in the strait is rough, and a bad run of it thins supply for days at a time.

Nearby

Invercargill is twenty minutes north, and the ferry to Stewart Island leaves from the Bluff wharf.