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A couple dining at a New Jersey restaurant got a nice surprise with their meal: a pearl potentially worth thousands of dollars in one of their clams. Last week, Michael Spressler was dining with his wife Maria at The Lobster House Restaurant in Cape May. Michael was enjoying his usual appetizer, a dozen clams on the half shell, when he got a little something extra with one of his clams.
“I was down to the 12th one, and when I picked it up on the fork, it looked kinda heavy, but I didn’t think nothing of it,” Michael recalls. But when he started to eat it, he noticed something in his mouth. At first he thought he might have broken a tooth, but it turned out to be a large pearl.
Sarah Stadnicar, who’s worked at The Lobster House for ten years, has never heard of someone finding a pearl in their clam or oyster, so the discovery is certainly special. And it was doubly special for the Spresslers since they were there celebrating the 34th anniversary of their first annual visit to the restaurant. The pearl measured 8.8-millimeters in diameter and is said to possibly be worth thousands, but Maria says they’re not interested in selling it. “It’s a beautiful remembrance of that day and what we have is so special,” she says.