These days, even the most well-heeled establishments are prone to serving up excessively briny, mushy bivalves. But not Blue Water Grill. Here, a team of experts makes careful checks of temperature, freshness, and quality. If an oyster is warmer than 45 degrees and older than 36 hours, it doesn’t make it through the door. “It’s also important to rotate several different varieties into one another, so that you don’t wind up with bluepoints seven days a week,” says Steve Hanson, the restaurant’s proprietor. Even the slightly squeamish are catered to here -- Blue Water Grill’s menu includes a wine-list-like “oyster index” detailing different varieties and flavors, as well as four to six “beginner oysters” -- for the uninitiated or just those, says Hanson, “who have been burned in the past, and now they’re scared.”

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