My friends, if any of you reading this are firstborn children, then you understand me when I say that we are born to be experiments for our parents. Isn’t it widely accepted by parents as well that the first child is always unchartered waters, and people learn to become parents? I suppose that is why the eldest child is always a wee bit different from its siblings. I’m certainly not complaining about being the firstborn, because a lot of attention went into diversifying my palate, with my parents insisting I try all kinds of food from a very young age. It honestly became a family affair, with my grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins wanting me to try out all sorts of delicious treats. Having the majority of my family living abroad contributed greatly to my culinary knowledge from America, the UK and even Europe! So whether it was the American southern fried chicken, or the Parisian croissant, I knew about them all. Being a voracious reader and born with the love for food, it was only natural that I was open to trying out everything my family introduced me to. As I entered my teens and early twenties, exposure to social media and television also introduced me to more exotic things, like the Scottish haggis, which can’t be worse than our Pakistani katakat, and the Louisiana-style seafood boil.

The latter I was more interested in for over a decade, because I do have a particular love for seafood, but it seemed like such a tedious and expensive cooking experiment that I never worked up the gumption to try a seafood boil at home myself. Also considering that if my family didn’t like it, then I would either have to eat it all, or risk having it go to waste. So, I waited. And waited. And waited some more for someone, anyone, to open a seafood boil restaurant in Karachi. I’ll be completely transparent, had I discovered that a seafood boil eatery had opened in any part of Pakistan, I would have definitely planned a trip and gone alone if I had to!

Now, what is a seafood boil, exactly? The name kind of sort of gives it away; boiled seafood. But it’s so much more than that. It’s a communal meal, a festive affair which involves the entire family from preparation to consumption. A variety of seafood including shrimp, crab, clams, mussels, crawfish and even lobster. Other than that, there can be sausages, potatoes and corn added to it as well. A mixture of seasonings, primarily Cajun is used to boil all the seafood, potatoes, sausage and corn, along with aromatics like onions and garlic. The seafood boil is served with lemon and an herb-butter dipping sauce of some kind for the seafood, and heaps of rice, making it the perfectly decadent meal. Now remember I said this is a communal meal? I wasn’t kidding. The boil is commonly dumped out as soon as its done cooking into the center of a large table and surrounded by rice to contain its juices, and then people gather around to enjoy it with companionship and conversation. With my love for food, family and friends, a seafood boil had been on my bucket list for a while.

Enter, Oyster Bay, a seafood boil restaurant recently opened at Khayaban-e-Seher in Karachi. And guess who went there and had a great time? That’s right…me! As I always do, I gave the eatery time to settle in, work out its minor issues which can build up to be an unpleasant experience for customers, and also for the insane rush to calm down. Being a small physical space, and with all the social media hype, Oyster Bay was initially booked in advance for days and it would be impossible to get a foot in. After a few months, I finally braved my way there with a friend, and we went relatively early so as to get two seats. It was a wise decision because as we were wrapping up our meal, the waiting game for new guests had begun. Let’s move on to the experience itself.

The aesthetic of the eatery is very nicely done, with a crab as the cute mascot on the walls, tissue paper boxes, plastic gloves and large plastic bibs. The last bit makes sense because seafood boils are meant to be eaten with your hands and can turn out to be pretty messy. For a relatively small space, the tables were nicely spaced out and not crowded in together, something I appreciated. Upon perusal of the menu, there were other delicious-looking items but my mind was focused on the seafood boil. I did however, deviate for a minute and ordered nachos, which were quite underwhelming with bottled salsa and cheese.

A little side note for those who are being dragged to a seafood boil but don’t like seafood, you can enjoy their chicken options too! The Cajun Feast seafood boil claims to have clams, squid, shrimp, mussels, crab, razor clams, garlic potatoes and corn. You can choose between the two people and four people option, and also what kind of sauce you want. We went with the ‘spiciest’ sauce, the Mexican and awaited our meal.

Upon arrival, it was quite the show, with several metal bowls holding our seafood boil and rice which was spread out on the table for us; the seafood boil with all the promised seafood, potatoes and corn in the center, surrounded by rice. With our bibs already on, we decided to forego the plastic gloves, and dug right in. While the clams, crabs, mussels, potatoes and corn were delicious, the shrimp was slightly overcooked, which I have heard happens often in seafood boils due to residual heat, hence it made peeling the shrimp a little difficult. Just to give you a heads up, the shrimp are boiled with the head and the tail, so if that’s something your squeamish about, you can ask someone else to peel the shrimp for you. I have seen my fair share of seafood boil mukbangs (don’t judge me, they’re delicious to watch, okay?), and despite knowing shrimp heads are great to suck on to get the juices out, I wasn’t quite that brave yet, and discarded them. The potatoes and corn were nicely tender, although I didn’t see much of any garlic action, and while it was a fun experience, I do have to say the spiciest spice level was a little underwhelming.

Since we were still feeling a little puckish, we went with the only available dessert on the menu, the Chocolate Heaven Cake Slice. It wasn’t exactly heavenly, if I’m being honest, and the vanilla ice cream helped only slightly. I would recommend skipping dessert here and going for better options. By the end of our meal, I was satiated but not exactly full, and didn’t have even the slightest sizzle of spice on my palate. As for the price point and value for money, I know that seafood is expensive, so went in expecting that I’d have a bill of at least Rs. 10,000, making it Rs. 5,000 per head, my estimate was slightly off, but with tip exceeded the amount I had predicted.

Since I’ve only been to Oyster Bay once and only had a few things off their menu, I will conclude by saying one should go and try it out if they have a passion for seafood and extra money in their pocket. I do want to revisit to try other items, including the dim sum and quarter chicken, but I’ll go the next time I have some extra money on hand.