BATON ROUGE, La. — “He was a bold man that first ate an oyster,” said 18th-century Irish satirist Jonathan Swift. Whether enjoyed fried, grilled, in a seafood gumbo or, perhaps most opinion dividing, raw, there is no denying the oyster’s impact on both Louisiana’s culture and seafood industry.
Oysters have been consumed by humans for thousands of years. Wealthy Greeks and Romans thought of them as a delicacy and an aphrodisiac. While the former is still true in many cultures, the latter is more debatable.
Oysters are high in zinc, with six medium-sized ones providing 32 milligrams or 291% of the daily value, according to Healthline.com. Studies have shown that zinc is important to testosterone production in males, which would lend credence to the aphrodisiac theory, but it isn’t fully known if that is the actual reason for the long-held belief.
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