Shall we address the elephant in the room? Let's talk about Norovirus.
We all know it is a risk to eat a raw oyster, this is nothing new but norovirus was bad last winter, worse than it has been before. Not just for us, but for oyster farms around the country. We have seen English oysters being taken off many menus and in their place French, Irish and Scottish oysters, which is such a shame. English oysters, particularly our oysters, are amongst the best oysters in the world.
Do you remember the Pyefleet Pure?
If you have been a customer for a while, you will remember our Pyefleet Pure Oyster that was guaranteed norovirus free. As the purification process was something we had developed in house, we relied upon testing each batch of oysters to provide a certificate to say they were norovirus free. When the only UK laboratory to offer norovirus testing stopped testing for norovirus, we couldn't prove they were norovirus free so had to stop the process.
A testament to not giving up
Introducing our new norovirus free oyster - The Colchester Pyefleet
Our new oyster, the Colchester Pyefleet, goes through a high pressure process where it’s subjected to 6000bar of pressure, three times the pressure at the deepest part of the ocean, that kills all virus and bacteria. It’s a widely used process within the food industry with things like orange juice and olives but also other seafood like lobsters. HPP lobsters are widely available and mass produced in Canada. Paul thought that the same process could be applied to oysters and there are a couple of other oyster farms who do HPP oysters, one in the USA and one in Holland but nobody over here apart from us.