Hog Island Oyster General Store
The retail window at the front gate of the Marshall farm, open every day from nine, selling the oysters live and unshucked.1
Why go
You buy here and shuck them yourself. The farm sells its own harvest alongside seasonal varieties of oysters and shellfish purchased directly from growers we know and trust,
and everything goes out live.1 The fin fish is the part worth planning around. It comes in from small day boats off Marin + SF Coasts,
which is a shorter chain than anything you will find at a counter in the city.1 There are picnic meats and cheeses on the same shelves, plus small plates out of the farm kitchen, so the whole lunch can come from this one window. Shucking gloves and knives are for sale beside the hats.
Order this / avoid
- Order: a dozen of whatever the farm pulled that morning, a piece of day-boat fish, and something to put on bread.1
- Avoid: treating this as the oyster bar. The Boat Oyster Bar sits on the same farm and runs Thursday to Monday only, with reservations recommended Friday through Monday.2
Good to know
- Open daily 9am to 5pm, closed Thanksgiving and Christmas Day. That is wider than The Boat and needs nothing booked.1
- Thursday is shuck-your-own at The Boat, walk-ins only, 11am to 4pm, if you want to eat on the farm.2
- Farm tours run from the same address.2
Verdict
could-visit — This is a shop window at the front of a farm, and a shop window does not carry a higher rung on its own no matter how good the shellfish is. The reason to keep it separate from the oyster bar behind it is practical: the store opens every day at nine and needs nothing booked, which makes it the fallback when The Boat is full or shut. The rung would move if a critic wrote up what comes out of that farm kitchen.