“Clean, briny, and succulent”—that’s how California chef Rory Herrmann described Island Creek Oysters. Chef Ming Tsai says, “Consistently plump and juicy—they taste like the sea.” For Duxbury, Massachusetts, oyster farmer Skip Bennett, that’s music to his ears.

For Bennett, though, it was a rough start. A longtime harvester of clams and mussels, and a business-school graduate, he took a stab at seeding quahog clams in Duxbury Bay—and they just didn’t take. Enter a chance meeting with oyster farmer Christian Horne, of Maine’s Chance Along Farm, who had great oyster seed but needed space to farm them. A partnership was born, and with the help of Skip’s dad (and former lobsterman) Bill Bennett, Island Oysters came to be in 1992. Now they’re a team of more than 20 farmers, “suits,” and “road warriors,” as Bennett calls them. And chefs across the country daily await their shipment of Island Creek’s finest.

In 2010 Jeremy and Lisa Sewall, of Boston restaurant Lineage, teamed up with Skip Bennett, to bring Island Creek Oyster Bar to the city.  It’s a casual place dedicated to celebrating the diversity of New England Seafood seafood and the passion of the people who farm.